


in my life i love you more

by youlldo (mcrs)



Category: The Beatles (Band)
Genre: M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Time Travel, but i've wanted to write a time travel one for ages, hoooo boy this is my first time writing a mclennon fic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2020-02-10
Packaged: 2021-01-15 20:49:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 33,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21259451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcrs/pseuds/youlldo
Summary: This isn’t his room.Or rather, it is – his room from when he wastwenty-one.-Paul McCartney falls asleep age 78 on the fortieth anniversary of John's death, and wakes up in 1963.





	1. Chapter 1

Paul watches the clock tick over into midnight with a dull ache in his stomach.

December the 8th, 2020. Forty years to the day since John died.

Paul swirls the dregs of whiskey around the tumbler in his hand, staring through it as though on the other side of the glass are answers to questions he doesn’t even know how to form. He’s lived more of his life without John than with him now, and yet he still feels like a fish out of water; floundering, still not quite sure how to survive without him.

Paul’s whole life is categorised into Before John, John, and After John. Before John is a haze, cold and dreary Liverpool days blurring into one another, only vague recollections of colours other than drab grey and listless blue. John had been such a shock to his system; the introduction of electricity in a world of candles, of colour to a world in monochrome, of adrenaline in a world of routine. And After John…well, Paul thinks, smiling wryly as he downs the last of the whiskey, savouring the way it burns his itching throat. After John is like eternally wading through knee-deep mud that always looks like it’s going to end but never does.

Things had been tenuous when John died. They’d been friends again, but in that fragile way that meant they skirted around real friendship and kept it superficial, never diving beneath the surface. Paul had been happy to have that – happy to have _any_ part of John back in his life – but it wasn’t enough. If he’d known-

He has to break that thought off sternly. Years of therapy have taught him that – he can’t dwell on alternative pasts, follow _what if_s down their yellow-brick roads, he has to learn to live with the one he landed with. He can’t change the past.

But if he could, _God_ how he would. He’d tell John the things that now, as an old man, he has the wisdom to know he should never have kept inside. He’d not play coy, emotionally hard-to-get, but make sure John knew how _vital_ he was to Paul’s life. He’d stop thinking only about himself, about the smarting pain John’s departure to New York had caused and how much he wanted John to feel that same pain. He wouldn’t take every day John lived as a given. 

There isn’t a single thing on this world Paul wouldn’t give to go back and change it.

_Not a single thing?_ A little voice in his mind asks.

No, Paul thinks wistfully. Not a single thing.

\---------------

When Paul wakes, his whole body is stiff and aching.

Well, he supposes, that’s what happens when you’re seventy-eight and fall asleep in an armchair after a night of drinking to get through the anniversary of your best friend’s death.

Bleary-eyed, he stretches, yawning as he feels his spine popping, and rubs at the emerging crick in his neck. Bloody hell, age really takes its toll. Just as he’s about to stand up and finally switch his brain on, someone pounds on the door.

“Get up, lazy sod,” they shout, and Paul freezes, eyes flying open.

He knows that voice. He’d know that voice anywhere.

His heart is somehow in his stomach and his mouth and his feet at the same time.

“George?” he manages to croak out. For a split second, when he hears nothing but silence, he starts to relax. It must have just been the tail end of a dream – shame that he doesn’t remember the rest, he thinks wistfully. Then, however, his brain finally kicks into gear and starts communicating with his eyes.

This isn’t his room.

Or rather, it is – his room from when he was _twenty-one_.

Panic sets in, hitting so hard it blurs his vision. Did he take something accidentally with his whiskey last night? But no, this doesn’t look like a drug-induced hallucination (and Paul’s a veritable expert on those) – is he _dead_? Oh God, he’s fucking dead, isn’t he? He’s dead, and the afterlife is 1963. Did he remember to re-do his will like he’s been meaning to do for ages and putting off? Will the kids be alright – and the grandkids? Fucking hell, he shouldn’t have kept rejecting his lawyer’s calls–

Another bang on the door interrupts his sudden onset of panic.

“Are you up yet?" 

Paul’s blood runs cold. He swallows, throat dry.

“George?” he asks, voice cracking.

“Yeah?” comes the voice on the other side of the door.

“Am I dead?” The door opens with a creak. 

“Are you bloody what?” George sounds – and looks – bemused. Paul blinks at him.

It’s him. There’s no faking that little crease between his brows, the way one side of his mouth pulls up more than the other, the slightly unsure way he always holds himself. It’s George Harrison from 1963, and that can mean only one thing.

“Oh fuck, I’m dead,” Paul whispers faintly, and promptly passes out.

\---------------

“You what?” a distant voice is asking, sounding almost amused. “Dead?”

“That’s what he kept saying,” another voice says, a note of concern in their tone.

“How’d’you know he didn’t just drink too much last night?” a more bored-sounding voice asks. “I know I’ve wanted to be dead after a few sometimes.”

“No, this was different,” the second voice says. “He really- he really thought he was dead.” Paul shifts a little, face scrunching in discomfort, trying to get further away from the voices. He wants to go back to sleep. He was having a weird dream – George was there – and-

“Paul?” the first voice asks. Paul, realising he’s given himself away by shifting, reluctantly opens his eyes to see a face leaning over him.

“Hullo,” says John Lennon evenly.

Paul blacks out again.

\---------------

When he wakes up again, he notices by the sterile white environment that he’s in a hospital.

This makes a lot more sense, he thinks. Everything has been part of a drug-induced dream. He must have been sedated, and that’s why he was having such strangely lucid dreams. Yes, that’s it, he decides, settling back into his pillow.

The door opens, and a young nurse looks in.

“Oh! Mr McCartney, you’re awake!” She sounds flustered, and nervously tucks an errant strand of hair behind her ear.

“So I am,” Paul says pleasantly. He always tries to humanise himself as much as possible.

“They’ve been asking to see you,” the nurse says.

“Who?” Paul asks. Christ, was he out long enough for his kids to come down? Was it that serious?

“The others,” the nurse says, sounding confused. “Shall I send them in? Visiting hours ended two hours ago, but…” she trails off with an awkward giggle, and Paul smiles. He’s not one to abuse his celebrity status often, but he’ll never pass up an opportunity to see his kids.

“Yeah, please,” he says, and she nods, blushing slightly, and backs out of the room.

“…your fuckin’ fault.” Paul hears Ringo’s distinctive voice getting louder, and frowns, wondering what Ringo’s doing here. It must have been pretty serious for Ringo to come down.

“How’s it my fault, eh?” an outraged voice asks. “All I did was wake him up.”

“Aye, and then he started muttering about being dead. Wasn’t doing that before you woke him up,” another voice says drily.

Paul’s stomach drops, an oddly familiar sensation at this point. Before he has time to process what he’s just heard – or rather, who – the door bursts open, and in clatter Ringo, George, and John.

“You’re up!” George says. Paul looks at him faintly.

“You’re alive,” he whispers. George frowns, stealing a quick glance to Ringo and John.

“Unfortunately,” John says breezily. “Tried to kill him off, we did, found a great new lead guitarist. Good-looking, that one is, too.” Paul doesn’t take his eyes off George. He can’t bear to look at John, young John, lively and full of dry wit.

“Paul, mate, are you…are you feeling alright?” George asks.

“You’re alive,” Paul repeats, voice steadier this time.

“Should we call the nurse?” Ringo asks.

“Best do,” George says, that crease of concern back between his brows.

“Am I dead?” Paul asks.

“See,” George says, both triumph and anxiety in his voice. “Told you.”

“I’ll go get the nurse,” Ringo says decisively.

“Ringo,” Paul says, eyes flitting to him. It’s Ringo alright, but not the Ringo Paul saw only two weeks ago. This is young Ringo, early twenties, still not sure about his place in the band. “You’re young." 

“Thanks,” Ringo says, pausing in the doorway.

“You looked so old last time I saw you." 

“Well, I haven’t got any younger since yesterday, mate,” Ringo says, and with that he leaves the room. Paul laughs, and it comes out bitter. If only he knew.

“And what am I then, the next-door neighbour?” John says idly, but Paul hears the indignant undertone in his voice. Finally, slowly, he braces himself, and turns to look at John.

John’s leaning against the wall, eyebrows half-cocked in what looks like a casual, almost bored manner, but Paul sees the lines of worry in his face, the hint of fear in his light brown eyes.

“John,” he whispers. “My God, John. You’re so young.” His fingers twitch, itching to reach out and touch John, but he can’t bring himself to do that. If his fingers pass through John, if John disintegrates at his touch, if this is another hallucination or dream, it’ll be like losing him all over again. 

“You’re mental,” John says, shaking his head.

“You’re here,” Paul says, and he hears the wonder and awe in his own voice.

“Aye,” John says, and leaves it at that. A split second later, the nurse comes bustling back in with Ringo in tow.

“Mr Starr tells me you’re experiencing some shock, Mr McCartney,” the nurse says.

“Not half as much as the rest of us,” George mutters.

“Yes, I think so,” Paul says calmly. “It seems to be 1963.” The nurse’s brow furrows. 

“Mr McCartney…it _is _1963.”

\---------------

Paul’s kept in the hospital for three more days, and every day he wakes up and is stuck in the same place, forcing him to accept that it’s real. It gives him time to ponder his situation. He spends the first day convinced he’s dead and gone to some twisted form of heaven, but the number of painful needles he gets shoved into him on an almost hourly basis convince him that no, this can’t be heaven – heaven’s supposed to be full of _good _things. Then he thinks perhaps it’s hell, until a little voice in his mind tells him whoever were to create his personal hell would never put John in there, as it’d have the complete opposite effect. So eventually, Paul has to conclude that he’s alive.

The second day, his theory is that the _rest_ of his life, his kids and grandkids, that _that_ was all a dream. He demands to read the newspapers Brian brings to read while he sits with Paul. Bemused, Brian hands them over, and Paul scans the headlines in a strange frenzy, searching for something without knowing quite what he’s looking for. The majority of the news is bland, things that Paul would have forgotten anyway, but certain things look familiar – Macmillan resigning, for example, he definitely remembers that - which means that the rest of his life hadn’t been a dream.

On the third day, John comes to visit him, and he starts thinking outside the box when his hand brushes John’s and John doesn’t disappear, hand warm and soft and _real_. Maybe this is a parallel universe – maybe he’s living some alternate life on a different Earth as a different Paul. But that doesn’t explain his memories of the future, so he’s left with only one conclusion.

Time travel. 

If he’s time travelled, he doesn’t know what the hell he’s supposed to do. His wife, kids, grandkids – they’re all gone. Even if he meets them again, has them again, they won’t be his. And fuck if Paul can remember the conception of each one of his children, and surely he’d have to get the situation _exactly_ right to replicate it, and who’s to say the right sperm cell would reach the egg-

“‘Ere, Paul,” John says placidly, pulling Paul out of his spiralling thoughts. He’s sat on the chair next to Paul’s bed, looking shrewdly at Paul. The blinds are drawn, so it’s late, and John’s the only one with him, meaning everyone else has taken the sensible decision to go home, so it’s very late. “You got a fag?” Paul stares at him. 

“I’m in fucking hospital, John,” he says. John grins.

“You feeling better, then?” he asks. Paul feels momentarily stupid for not realising that that had been a trick question. _You haven’t dealt with John’s strange communication style for decades, though_, that little voice in his head says. Somehow, even with John sitting right in front of him, the reminder of his loss causes a pang of pain.

“John,” Paul says lowly, and then stops. 

“Aye?” John asks. Paul takes a deep breath. He’s promised himself countless times over the years that if he ever somehow managed to see John again, he’d not be as cowardly as he was when he first had the chance.

“You alright?” he asks instead. John looks at Paul curiously.

“Yeah, ‘m alright,” he says finally.

“You’re not,” Paul says, building up courage. John’s momentarily taken aback, but it’s quickly replaced with annoyance.

“Who’re you to say that?” he asks brusquely.

“John,” Paul says, and stops again, searching for the words. He sighs. “I don’t know how to say it. You’re right here, and I always told myself that if this situation arose…” he trails off.

“If what situation arose, you losing your bloody mind in a posh London hospital?” John’s still guarded, deflecting with humour. Paul, however, detects the undertone of fear that he’d seen three days ago when he first woke up – and it clicks. He’s scared John by being in this state.

“John,” Paul tries again. Third time lucky.

“What?” John asks, sounding irritated now.

“You know I’ll never leave you.”

There. It’s out there now, Paul thinks. There’s so much more to say, so much more Paul needs to get out – but this is the most important thing.

There’s an incredibly long pause. John studies Paul, and Paul blinks back. John seems to be weighing up what to say next. Paul knows it goes one of three ways with John – anger, which means he’s embarrassed, humour, which means he’s ashamed, or sincerity, which is probably the scariest of the three for the both of them.

“I know,” John says eventually, but his eyes have softened, the edge of fear gone. He hadn’t _really _known. Paul was right to say it.

“Good,” Paul says boldly, “because I won’t. Not ever.” John’s smiling now.

“Daft git,” he says, and Paul hears the fondness in his tone.

\---------------

Eventually, Paul’s allowed to check himself out and go home.

Home. He’s not entirely sure where that is right now. Is it still the room he woke up in in Liverpool, or has he moved in with Jane already?

Luckily for him, he’s bundled into a taxi with the rest of them heading up north, so he figures that answers that.

“You gave us a right fright,” Ringo says, as the taxi pulls out of the hospital car park. 

“Thought John’d have to write all the songs and we’d be forgotten by the end of the year,” George says, dodging the inevitable kick from John.

“You’d be forgotten ‘cause I’d strike out solo,” John says. Paul swallows back the nasty acidic taste that suddenly rises like bile in his throat.

“Oh aye, and do what?” George asks. John wags a finger at him. 

“Never you mind,” he says. “I’m not spilling my secrets.” 

“What month is it?” Paul asks suddenly. All three turn to look at him. 

“Bloody hell, how long’s it going to be ‘til you’re right again?” John mutters.

“October,” Ringo supplies helpfully.

“Your birthday,” Paul says to John. John gives him a funny look.

“Yeah, it was great ‘til some tosser woke up the next morning convinced he was dead,” he says. Paul’s lips quirk up in a smile. So _that’s_ why his whole body had ached the next day.

“Next morning wasn’t your birthday anymore,” he says. Then a thought hits him, and he blurts – “Christ, JFK’s going to die this year, isn’t he?” He immediately starts silently panicking because fuck, has he just broken a rule of time travel? Is the world going to implode now because he just told three people JFK was going to die? Maybe they’ll get found out for knowing he was going to die and get arrested on suspicion of being involved in the plan. That’d be a headline and a half – _Beatles kill JFK._ John would probably love it.

“Oh aye, you communicating with spirits or something now?” John says, one eyebrow raised. “Go on, give me a reading.” Paul’s filled with momentary relief that it’s not been taken seriously, but it quickly dissipates upon realising that when JFK _does_ get shot, there’s going to be some interesting questions asked of him. He shakes the thought off – that’s a problem for another day.

“Getting a spirit coming in for a daft twenty-three year old…” Paul says, squinting and moving his hands around in a mysterious manner. 

“It’s for you, Ringo,” John says.

“Ha ha,” Ringo says sarcastically. 

“Ho ho,” John replies, equally dry.

“Ha,” George inputs.

“Ho,” John responds.

Paul turns to look out of the window, tuning out the ensuing conversation, willing away the nauseous feeling that hasn’t quite left his throat since the day he woke up in his old bedroom. He watches blocks of flats merge into flat open fields as the car rattles out of London and into the Midlands, every synapse in his brain working overtime to come to terms with what logically Paul knows must be true. 

Suddenly, Paul yelps and recoils from the window. The other three stop their conversation, alarmed.

“Sorry,” Paul mutters. He’s had enough of them thinking he’s insane. “Just…saw my reflection. Startled me.”

“Think how we feel, mate,” John says, and the conversation Paul had interrupted slowly picks up again.

God, Paul thinks, staring at his reflection again and bringing his hands to his face in wonder. His eyes are so wide, so round, and his eyelashes long and dark, fanning out over his pale skin when he lowers his eyes. His skin is soft, unblemished, no deep wrinkles and sagging jowls after years of wear and tear. His hair is dark, so much darker than he remembers it being, matched by arched eyebrows that frame his big, round eyes. And his lips are so _full_; he touches them gently, amazed that he never realised just how fucking _pretty_ he was. He’d always resented the light-hearted teasing that he looked like a girl, but now…

He’s snapped out of his reverie by a nudge to his shoulder.

“Want me to take a picture so you can wank over it later?” John asks.

“Sod off,” Paul says, shoving him back. “I’m just…so young.”

“Aye, that you are,” John says. “Back in my day, we took people to Paris for our twenty-first birthdays. Your generation just…what was it you did? Threw a huge party and got blackout drunk before it even started?” Paul groans, queasy stomach twisting at the vivid memory from fifty-seven years ago. 

“Don’t, I feel sick,” he warns. John grins.

“We’re only ‘bout fifteen minutes out of Liverpool,” he says. Paul’s heart starts racing.

“Oh, fuck,” he whispers without thinking. He hadn’t even thought about the fact he’d be seeing his _dad_ again, after God knows how many years. John frowns at him.

“Paul,” he says, and he sounds concerned.

“I’m fine, sorry,” Paul says, waving it aside. John’s frown doesn’t let up.

“You’re not,” he says. “What’s got into you, eh? You take something you shouldn’t’ve at my birthday?" 

“No,” Paul says, “‘m fine.” He says it a little more insistently this time.

“Right, well,” John says. “Didn’t know ‘fine’ looked like thinking you’re dead and passing out every time someone spoke to you then spending three days in a hospital.”

“Maybe you’ve never been fine then,” Paul retorts. “Should try it some day, it’s a right laugh.”

“You’re daft,” John says, shaking his head. “Don’t know why we keep you around.” Paul grins.

“I write the hits,” he says, and he definitely earnt the shove he got for that.

\---------------

Paul’s heart is thudding by the time he gets to his all-too-familiar front door. He knocks twice, and hears his father taking his leisurely time getting from the living room to the hallway to answer the door.

“Paul!” he exclaims, when he opens the door, looking simultaneously concerned and pleased. “Are you alright? I had a phone call from Brian after you collapsed here. Apparently some funny business with you thinking you were dead? And they sorted you out in a London hospital?” 

“Yeah, dad,” is all Paul can manage, a lump suddenly stuck in his throat. His father looks relieved.

“Well, come in then, lad,” his dad says, standing aside, and Paul lugs his suitcase through the doorway into the narrow hallway. His dad shuts the door behind him, and Paul hesitates for a moment. 

“You alright, Paul?” his father asks.

“Dad,” Paul says. “God, it’s you." 

“‘Course it’s me,” his dad says. “Now get that stuff upstairs, I want you down here to lay the table for tea.” His face takes on a look of slight discomfort, as though discussing something extremely unsavoury. “John rang, said he’s been ordered to stay the night with you in case something happens. You know I’d much rather stay with you, Paul, you don’t need that lad around here…”

“No, dad, it’s alright,” Paul says, still slightly dazed. He’s not really taken any of that in, but vaguely files away _why the hell is John coming?_ in the mental box labelled ‘Think About Later’ which is currently overflowing with panicked questions about the past and future.

“Well, get a move on, then,” Paul’s dad says when Paul doesn’t move. Paul shakes himself out of it.

“Right, yeah, sorry,” he says, dragging his bag up the stairs as his father disappears into the kitchen below.

He gets to his bedroom, dumping his back unceremoniously on the floor, and immediately sinks onto the bed.

Christ. He’s in the past. He, Paul McCartney, who is actually seventy-eight years old, is in his twenty-one year old body in 1963.

What the fuck is he going to do now?


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yes i've messed around a little bit with the times they recorded certain songs but this is fanfic after all

John doesn’t arrive until well past eleven, probably knowing Jim’ll be in bed by then. Paul knows John prefers to avoid him if he can, more for Paul’s sake than his own – John can never help himself when a snide remark is at the tip of his tongue, and Paul hates to be caught in the middle.

“Be quiet,” Paul hisses, when John loudly announces his arrival upon Paul opening the door.

“Whatever’s got into you’s not knocked the prissiness out of you, then,” John says, elbowing past Paul to get inside and out of the cold.

“Why are you even here?” Paul asks.

“Brian’s orders,” John says. Paul very much doubts that.

“I very much doubt that,” he says.

“Alright, Ringo and George’s orders,” John says. “And mine.” Paul doesn’t have it in him to fight, not when his mind is still playing what will probably be a very long game of catch-up, so he just motions John up the stairs.

“Still a tip,” John comments loftily when he gets to Paul’s room, dumping his bag on the floor next to Paul’s.

“Right, like you’re one to talk,” Paul mutters. “I’m fine, anyway. Don’t know what you’re making such a fuss for.”

“Oh, right,” John says sarcastically, throwing himself onto the bed, “fussing over nothing, we are. You know we have an album to finish? Supposed to be done by the twentieth? How are we meant to do that with a bassist who thinks he’s dead?” Paul’s eyes widen. The music.

“Uh,” he says intelligently. “I don’t think I’m dead. Anymore,” he tacks on, because, well, in all fairness, he had thought he was.

“Oh, well, why didn’t you just say so? That makes it all better,” John says. Paul’s barely listening. The _music_.

Firstly, Paul doesn’t even know which bloody album they’re on right now. This was the problem, he lamented, with doing as much music as they had done back then – if they’d released an album every few years like most modern (or, he supposed wryly, future) bands, he wouldn’t have this issue. But he couldn’t exactly come out and ask what bloody album they were currently recording, or he’d probably get sent back to that swanky London hospital fit for a Beatle.

He doesn’t even know if he can still remember the songs. How’s it going to look when he turns up in the studio and suddenly can’t play a song he supposedly wrote a few months ago, probably played only last week? And there’s nothing to help him – can’t ask anyone, and of course there’s no internet (although, he thinks, given that in this timeline the songs haven’t been released yet even if he _did_ have access to the internet it’d be a moot point) so he’s at a dead end.

“Paul?” John asks, snapping him out of his thoughts. Paul blinks, trying to reset himself and shake the panicked thoughts away.

“Yeah,” Paul says, and clears his throat as though it’ll ground him. “Album. Got it.” John gives him a funny look, and Paul tries for a smile. “Sorry, it’s just…I’m just tired,” he says, turning away from John and rummaging in his bag for pyjamas.

“How are you tired?” John asks. “Spent all day dozing in that hospital, you know.”

“Just pretending to,” Paul says, trying for humour to distract John from the fact he’s absolutely not engaged in this conversation at all. “Didn’t want to talk to you lot. Thought I’d take my chance.” 

“Don’t blame you, we’re incredibly boring,” John agrees, slipping off the bed and searching in his own bag for pyjamas. He starts taking off his shirt, and Paul finds he can’t look away. Christ, when was the last time he saw John like this, young and all soft around the edges? Well, he supposes, it was probably 1963 – the last time it came round.

“What?” John asks defensively, catching Paul’s stare. Paul feels heat rising to his cheeks and turns away to hide it.

“Just got lost in thought,” he mumbles.

“About my nipples?” Paul scowls and takes his own shirt off.

It feels fucking _weird_. He doesn’t even know this body anymore, although it’s still his, and now someone else is seeing it. He doesn’t have the time to explore it as he wants to with John in the room, although he notices that he’s a lot slimmer than he ever remembers being.

“I top, you tail,” John says, when they both have their pyjamas on, lying down with his head on Paul’s pillow.

“Hang on a second, this is _my_ bloody bed,” Paul protests.

“And I’m the guest, so I top,” John says.

“Guests are invited,” Paul points out.

“Yeah, I was invited,” John says, “by me. Now get in, it’s getting cold.” Paul’s not happy about this, but he gets in anyway. It’s only one night, after all. 

“Turn the light off,” he mumbles from under the duvet. Neither of them have brushed their teeth and it’s going to be disgusting in the morning, but he can’t bring himself to care right now. 

“Turn it off yourself,” John retorts. “This is your room.”

“It’s right next to you,” Paul says. 

“So it is,” John says, rolling over. “Goodnight.”

He’s unbelievable.

\---------------

Paul can’t sleep. 

Thoughts are running through his mind like they’re trying to beat some kind of world record. He thinks perhaps the atmosphere at the hospital dulled it a little, or maybe he’s just starting to fully realise what this potential time travel could really mean. 

Firstly, there’s no such thing as time travel. He’s somehow managed to do something physically impossible. There is absolutely no possible way he should or could be in 1963, but he is. Logically, it makes no sense at all, but with every passing second he’s _still there_, John’s feet pressing uncomfortably into him, and he’s left reeling trying to reconcile the fact that time travel isn’t real with the fact that he’s somehow back in 1963 with all of his future memories intact. 

The parts of his brain that aren’t taken up by trying to solve complicated scientific ideas about time travel are working overtime in fretting about what’s going to happen now. Does he just repeat the life he already led, and hope that fate will deal him the same cards? Does he risk changing things he regrets, and hope that fate won’t piss on him for it? Is it one of those things he read about where no matter what path you take, you always end up on the same road? 

God, he hopes not. He swallows down the lump in his throat and blinks back the sudden tears that welled up at thinking about loving and losing everyone again – John, Brian, Linda…no, he can’t live through that again. He won’t. He’s not going to sit and let Brian overdose, watch Linda waste away in front of him, wake up to that terrible, terrible phone call one cold December morning again… 

But his _kids_…how is he supposed to live a life without them? His heart breaks a little at the mere _thought_ of never seeing them again; how on Earth is he supposed to actually go through with it?

But then again…maybe this is only temporary? Maybe he’ll get pulled back to his real life, fifty-seven years in the future.

_And how are you supposed to live that life now?_ the little voice in his mind says. _Can you leave this all behind again? Leave George, Brian, _John_? _

He can’t. He knows he can’t.

But he can’t live without his kids either. He can’t live either life happily, now.

Fuck. _Fuck_.

“Hey,” a sleepy voice mumbles, heel digging into his shoulder. “Y’alright?”

“Yeah,” Paul whispers, voice too loud in the silent room now that John’s restless sleep noises have gone. The heel digs into his shoulder again.

“Paul,” John says.

“Yeah?” There’s a beat.

“You’d tell me if something was wrong, right?” Paul bites his lip. 

“As much as I could,” he settles on eventually. He doesn’t want to lie to John, doesn’t want to start whatever this is – his second life? – off like that. He wants to do things right this time. But he can’t tell him the truth, because – well. For obvious reasons, really. He doesn’t fancy spending his second life in an asylum.

“Paul.” John’s voice is less sleepy now, and there’s a shuffling sound. Somehow, even in the dark, Paul feels John’s eyes on him.

“I’m fine,” Paul says stubbornly. He can’t tell John what’s wrong. Where would he even begin, even if John were to believe him?

“What’s wrong with you, eh?” John’s voice is soft, concerned. 

“Nothing,” Paul says. 

“_Paul_.” 

“_John_.”

“Alright,” John says. “Compromise. You can at least tell me that there’s something wrong.” Paul, having fallen for one of John’s tricks earlier, scoffs.

“You don’t do compromises,” he says. “You’ll just see me agreeing to admit there’s something wrong as a sign to push me into admitting more.”

“So there _is _something wrong,” John says, with an audible grin. Paul swears under his breath. He’s _really _out of practice in conversation with John.

“Fine, fucking hell,” Paul says, throwing his hands up in frustration, although it brings nothing because it’s pitch black and John’s at the other end of the bed. “But I’m fine. I’ll be fine.”

“Which one?”

“What?”

“Are you fine, or will you be?” Paul takes a moment.

“I will be,” he says finally.

“Alright,” John says. There’s a pause, and then- “When you’re ready, I’ll be there.” Paul knows what he means, but it _stings_. To this John, in 1963, young and full of fear and life, it’s inconceivable that there could be anything that Paul won’t eventually want to confide in John.

Is this even _his _John? Paul’s not fully taken in the fact that it’s _a_ John let alone _his _John. It feels like he’s been talking to a clone – John’s _dead_. John’s dead, and he’s not twenty-three, and he’s not here talking to Paul.

_You know it’s your John_, that little voice in his head says. _You’re keeping him at a distance so you won’t get hurt_. Paul resolves to look into getting it to shut up as soon as possible.

“Thanks,” Paul says, when he finally remembers to respond, and he’s surprised to find he means it.

\---------------

Their stay in Liverpool turns out to be a quick pit stop, some Brian-ordered rest and recuperation before returning to the studio so they can be in tip-top shape. Paul doesn’t get to see much of the other lads, but enjoys the time he’s got with his dad instead. Somehow, weirdly, seeing his dad alive again is easier to accept and an easier pattern to fall back into than George or John. 

John had mentioned going home to Cynthia the next morning, and Paul had gaped at him for a moment.

“How’s Julian?” he’d asked. God, the last time he’d seen Julian he’d been _fifty-seven_. That’s older than John ever got.

(He’d pushed away the sudden queasiness at the thought.)

“Fine,” John had said, too nonchalantly, with a shrug. “Noisy. Shits himself. Screams and hits things. You know.”

“Takes after his father, then,” Paul had said. John had smiled, but it hadn’t reached his eyes. 

Paul had barely even remembered to ring Jane (God, she’s so far back on his list of priorities right now it almost makes him ashamed) until Mike had asked, with a strange look on his face, whether they’d broken up. Then he’d finally called, explained the basics (fainted, hospital, definitely haven’t time-travelled, yes I’ll see you soon) and filed that away in the box in his mind labelled Information You Really Should Act On But Can Feasibly Procrastinate For A Little While. 

The car journey back to London passes in a blur of trepidation. Will he remember the songs? What songs are they even playing? What if he messes up and starts mindlessly playing something from way later? By the time he’s run endless circles around himself in his mind the car is pulling up at the studio, and Paul gets out, guitar case in hand. 

Here, in 1963 2.0, he gets that exact same rush of adrenaline he always gets before entering the studio. Bigger, perhaps, and with a settling calmness, because this time he’s going in complete – the other half of his creative side is going to be there too.

He’s nervous about that, though. Being back in a studio with John is setting all sorts of nerves he didn’t even know he had off, making him jittery beyond belief. It just doesn’t feel _real_. Paul still thinks that every time John leaves his sight is going to be the last time he sees him.

“Took your bloody time,” George says, looking up from tuning his guitar when Paul walks in.

“Need my beauty sleep,” Paul says, setting his bass down and steadfastly not looking at George.

“Need more than you’re getting, clearly,” Ringo puts in, twirling a drumstick. He looks suitably bored.

“Where’s himself?” Paul asks.

“Himself’s got a name, you know,” a voice says from behind him, and Paul turns to find John. 

God. Is he ever going to overcome this _fuck, it’s John_ feeling? _Fuck, it’s John in my hospital room. Fuck, it’s John in my bedroom. Fuck, it’s John in the studio._ He needs to process it at some point; it’s John, it’s fucking _John_.

“Oh aye, what’d that be?” Paul finds himself asking.

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” John remarks.

“Starting with some overdubs today, boys,” George Martin’s tinny voice says from above, and Paul’s head snaps upwards. Bloody hell, George Martin’s alive. Paul vividly remembers his funeral, only four years ago. Or, he thinks, now fifty-three years in the future. It’s disconcerting to look at someone and see a ticking clock to their death.

“On what?” George asks.

“We’ll start with the lead vocals for Roll Over Beethoven,” George Martin says.

“Needn’t have bothered coming in so early, then,” John grumbles.

“George, what else are we doing today?” Paul asks. It’s not an odd question, he thinks; perfectly reasonable to want to be prepared for what’s to come.

“A lot of vocals,” George’s voice comes back. “And we’ll re-record All My Loving.”

“Right, thanks,” Paul says. _A lot of vocals_ doesn’t help him in any way whatsoever, but at least All My Loving is one he still remembers how to play. He puts down his bass and follows John out of the main studio room into a side-room, so as not to disturb George laying down his vocals.

“Fancy a smoke?” John says, and Paul looks at him quizzically. It’s one thing asking if he’s got fags on him, but if he wants to smoke? He hasn’t smoked in decades.

John looks just as quizzically back. “What?” he asks.

“Oh,” Paul says, realising that in 1963 he certainly hadn’t given up smoking yet. “Um.” What’s he supposed to do now? He doesn’t want to take the habit up again, not after seeing what it did to George. But won’t it look odd if he suddenly stops smoking in 1963? Will it have an impact on his future?

“It’s just a fuckin' smoke,” John says idly, but he sounds annoyed.

“I don’t smoke,” Paul says eventually. He figures that him not smoking won’t change anything drastically – not like _he _died of lung cancer. John laughs.

“Come off it,” he says.

“No, I’m serious,” Paul says. “It’s bad for you, y’know.”

“Since when d’you have a medical degree?” John says, putting a cigarette to his lips and lighting it. “Suit yourself.” 

“They’ll give you cancer,” Paul says.

“So will listening to you nag me, Christ,” John mutters, pointedly blowing smoke in Paul’s direction. “What the hell happened to you in that hospital, eh?”

“Learnt how to be healthy,” Paul says, dodging John’s cloud of smoke. That makes him think of something else- “I’m a vegetarian now too, y’know.”

“A what?” John asks.

“Vegetarian.” 

“You don’t eat meat?” John says in disbelief. Paul shakes his head. John takes a long drag of his cigarette, not taking his eyes off of Paul, and Paul holds his gaze.

“You’re mad, you are,” John says eventually. Paul grins – that’s the best he could have hoped for. “Sometimes I think you went into the hospital as Paul and came out as someone else.”

“Hey,” Paul says gently. “I’m still me.” It’s the truth, although John’s not too far off either. 

John looks at him, lips pursed around his cigarette. 

“Still our Paul?” he says.

“Still your Paul,” Paul agrees, and he sees the ghost of a smile flit across John’s lips.

“Alright,” John relents. “But don’t you think I’ll be cooking anything other than a Sunday roast when you come round.”

“Wouldn’t eat anything you cooked anyway,” Paul says, earning himself an elbow from John.

\---------------

All My Loving takes up most of the day, thankfully, because Paul’s still the same perfectionist at seventy-eight he was at twenty-one, and this time around he’s got the memory of what the released version is supposed to sound like to contend with. 

“No, I want the drums a bit slower,” he says, motioning at Ringo. He’s pretty sure they’re slower in the final version, at least.

“Alright, your highness,” Ringo mutters. Paul sends him a glare.

“Can we send him back to hospital?” George asks. He’s got a cigarette between his lips, and Paul has to quash the strong urge to stride over and pull it out. 

“You shouldn’t smoke,” he says instead.

“Oh, here he goes again,” John says, rolling his eyes. “Too good for fags now, he is. And meat.”

“Meat?” Ringo looks confused.

“Aye,” John says, “Mr Hoity Toity over here thinks he’s better than us lowly folk eating beef and all that.”

“What the hell happened in that hospital, mate?” George asks Paul, shaking his head.

“Cigarettes cause cancer,” Paul says stubbornly. He’s _not_ going to watch George die in front of him.

“Alright, bloody hell, don’t get your knickers in a twist,” George grumbles, but he stubs out his cigarette on a nearby ashtray. “Can we just get on with it? I want to go.”

“Don’t we all,” Ringo says drily, twirling a drumstick in his hand.

“Well, Paul seems content to be here all day,” John says.

“From the top, boys,” George Martin interrupts, and they’re off again.

In the end, it only takes seven takes until Paul’s satisfied.

“We’ll need to do a fair number of overdubs,” he says, squinting up at George Martin.

“Right,” George Martin says. He’s used to Paul’s perfectionist whims. “Can we get onto the vocals for Till There Was You now?” Bloody hell. Paul doesn’t even have a vague recollection of what that song sounds like, let alone the lyrics. 

Paul weighs up his options. He could ask Ringo for the lyrics, but he probably won’t know them. He could ask George, but George will tell John and then John will be upset that Paul confided in George rather than him, and Ringo will be upset everyone else knows something he doesn’t. But telling John, his final option, means he’ll probably get probed about what’s wrong with him even more than he already is. 

Fuck it, Paul thinks, taking a deep breath. There’s nothing else he can do, bar telling the entire group, and he knows John won’t grass him up.

“Can we take a break? I need to talk to John,” he asks George Martin, and gets a thumbs up in return. He catches George and Ringo exchanging a look as he steps back outside into the side-room, but they don’t seem too nonplussed by it. John follows Paul but doesn’t say anything, even after he’s closed the door behind him and Paul’s rounded on him. 

“Remember what you said the other night?” Paul says.

“Said quite a lot of things the other night,” John says. Paul waves him away, nervousness building the longer he doesn’t get out what he wants to ask. John already suspects Paul’s been replaced by an impostor; this is just going to add fuel to the fire.

“About being there.” John’s silent for a moment. Then-

“Yes,” he says. Paul knows John hates to discuss his momentary slips of sentimentality once the sun rises.

“I need you now,” Paul says plainly. John can’t hide the brief look of surprise that flits over his features at hearing such a bold statement from Paul; but, Paul supposes, in the first rendition of 1963 he wouldn’t have been caught dead speaking so honestly to John.

“What for?” John asks. Paul sighs, raking a hand through his hair, and then immediately flattens it against his forehead again. 

“Do you trust me?” he asks. John laughs.

“What sort of a question is that?” he asks. Paul doesn’t have time for this. He’s seventy-eight; that’s too old for skirting around the topic.

“Do you trust me?” he repeats.

“Why?” John asks. He sounds borderline suspicious now, and Paul’s starting to get exasperated with his incessant paranoia. _Not everyone’s out to get you, John_, he thinks, and then immediately feels guilty about it. If John had only been a little more mistrustful on December the 8th, 1980…

“I need you to trust me,” Paul says. John pauses, eyeing Paul shrewdly.

“You know I do,” he says quietly. Paul takes a deep breath. 

“I don’t know the words to any of these songs,” Paul admits. “Or the melodies. I don’t know the songs at all, really.” There. It’s out.

“What?” John says, and now he looks concerned. “Have you got amnesia?”

“No,” Paul says, and a manic laugh almost escapes him. If anything, he’s got too many memories. “But I don’t know these songs.” 

“You knew All My Loving,” John points out. Paul doesn’t know what to say to that. _That’s because it’s successful? _That’ll go down well. 

“I know,” Paul settles on. “But I don’t know these. I need your help.” Somehow, explicitly asking John for help sends a fire of adrenaline coursing through his veins; it feels daring, like he’s just taken a step over the edge of a cliff. The silence from John isn’t helping matters.

“Okay,” John says eventually.

“Okay?” Paul repeats, surprised. He’d been expecting a lot more resistance from John, a lot more prodding and probing. 

“I trust you,” John says simply, with a shrug, but he can’t look Paul in the eye as he says it. Expressing genuine feelings doesn’t come easy to him.

“John,” Paul says, placing a hand on John’s arm out of an instinctive need to protect him, let him know it’s okay. “I- Look. You’re going to have to trust me a lot for a while, okay?”

“Why won’t you just tell me what’s going on?” John asks. He sounds a mixture of irate, confused and hurt. 

“I _can’t_,” Paul says. “God, I wish I could, John. I really do. It would make things a lot easier.” 

“So _do it_,” John says. “What’s fucking stopping you, Paul?” Paul sighs.

“I can’t tell you that either,” he says. John pulls his arm away from Paul’s hand.

“Do you not trust _me_?” he asks. Paul rolls his eyes, annoyed now.

“Yeah, that’s why I’ve told you and no one else that I don’t remember any of the songs I wrote a few months ago,” he says. “You’re a right prat sometimes, John, y’know. Not everything’s about you." 

“Oh, aye, it’s my fucking fault now, is it?” John spits. 

“That’s not what I’m saying,” Paul says irritably. “Stop being so fucking melodramatic.”

“I’m being _melodramatic_?” John asks, voice rising. His eyes are blazing now, and nothing pretty ever comes from that. “Right, I’ll just go drink myself into a hospital visit and then come out and tell you I don’t remember my own songs, shall I? See how well you handle it?” 

Oh. _Oh_.

“John,” Paul sighs, anger completely dissipated. He hadn’t realised it was because John _cared_. Not about Paul keeping secrets from him, not about Paul leaving him, but about _Paul_.

“No, fuck you,” John says fiercely, making to leave. Paul, though, twenty-one year old reflexes in perfect working order, catches John’s hand in his own as he turns to the door.

“I’m sorry,” he says. John stills, and then slumps a little. Paul only vaguely notices that John doesn’t take his hand out of Paul’s. “I’m scared,” Paul admits after a moment, when John doesn’t say anything. “I’m really scared, John. I don’t- look, I can’t tell you what’s happening, because something bad might happen if I do, and I don’t really understand it all myself, and I’m _scared_.” John turns to face him again, but still doesn’t move his hand. 

Then, slowly, he reaches up to Paul’s face and gently wipes away a tear that Paul hadn’t even felt fall. The brief contact between John’s finger and Paul’s face is like an electric shock, and Paul doesn’t understand that either. There are so many things he doesn’t understand.

“You’re not making any sense,” John murmurs. His eyes still have an edge of anger to them, as though he’s not entirely sure whether to give up on his fury (which, knowing John, he probably isn’t).

“I know,” Paul says. “I'm not making any sense to me either.” John’s fingers lace their way between Paul’s, and he gives Paul’s hand a gentle squeeze. His fingers are rough and calloused, Paul notes vaguely. They feel different to a girl’s.

“Okay,” John says.

“Okay?” Paul echoes. 

“I’ll help you,” John says, in that decisive John Lennon I’ve-made-a-decision-and-I’ll-see-it-through-even-if-it-kills-me kind of way. Paul manages a smile.

“Thank you,” he says. John pulls his hand back with a brief smile, suddenly business-like.

“Well, then,” he says. “You got any paper? I’d best start writing down your own lyrics for you, you tosser.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know i'm churning this out like crazy right now but i'm just very inspired and pleased that my writer's block is finally cured so please forgive me for overloading you all

Paul, luckily, is a fast learner. Or rather, good at dredging up memories of songs he’d thought his mind had long overwritten.

He manages to sing a passable version of Till There Was You that very day, starting to feel a faint familiarity by the time John, sat cross-legged on the floor with an earnest expression on his face as he sings, gets to the chorus. It’s nothing stellar, and he does forget the lyrics a few times while they’re recording, but it’s enough to not draw any attention to himself.

The next three days are filled with much of the same; John and Paul come in early and stay late, until Paul’s got the entire album down as though he really had only written them a few months ago. John grins at him when he manages to get through the whole of All I’ve Got To Do without getting a single word wrong, eyes lighting up, and Paul feels something flare in the pit of his stomach that’s oddly familiar and yet he can’t identify.

The three days after that are a blur of recording, with Paul focusing so hard on not messing up songs which from everyone else’s perspective should be coming easily to him that by the time the day is over he’s absolutely shattered and can do nothing more than flop into bed in his hotel room. They finish the album only three days behind schedule, but, as Ringo points out, they’re technically early, since Paul spent three days in hospital and then they all had four days in Liverpool.

They go out for a celebratory dinner after the last song is finished, and Paul drinks a lot more than he should have, overexcited by his new (old?) young body, and spends the night retching into the toilet and feeling incredibly sorry for himself.

Paul wakes up the next morning with a headache so bad he seriously contemplates throwing himself out of the window before remembering he’s only on the first floor. God, he needs some paracetamol. Or morphine, frankly.

An ear-splitting sound cracks Paul’s head in two, making him scrunch his eyes and moan in pain, before he comes to his senses and realises it’s the telephone on his bedside table. He slaps a hand onto the table, feeling around until he finds the receiver, dead set on doing whatever it takes to stop that fucking _noise_.

“What,” he mumbles into the receiver.

“Paul?” It’s George.

“What,” Paul says again, no more enthusiastic than before.

“Bloody hell, are you alright?” George sounds startled. “D’you- I mean…d’you think you’re dead again?” Paul groans.

“Wish I were,” he says. “Drank too much last night.”

“Oh,” George says, sounding relieved. “Thought you might’ve been…that whatever happened before might have happened again.”

“Bloody hope it never happens again,” Paul mutters darkly. If he gets transported another couple of years back he’d be a fucking sperm cell, that’s how young he is.

“I was going to ask if you wanted to come round,” George says.

“No,” Paul says.

“Aye, I can hear that,” George says. “Should I come to you?” Paul wants to say no, but-

“Can you bring paracetamol?”

“Should be able to, yeah.”

“Then yes.” Paul can almost hear George’s eye-roll.

“Right charmer, you are,” he mutters.

“Your voice is hurting my head,” Paul tells him, and hangs up. At least he doesn’t feel sick anymore, he thinks. He’ll count that as a win.

Paul drifts in and out of sleep until George arrives, his loud knock startling Paul out of a dream that fused John and George with Heather and James. It’s a world that can’t exist outside of Paul’s dreams, and he’s resentful that he had to wake up.

“Come in,” Paul says, raising his voice as loudly as he dares and wincing at the reverberations it causes in his head. He doesn’t look up as George enters, just hears the click of the door behind him.

“I’ve got your drugs,” George says. Finally.

“Bring ‘em here,” Paul demands.

“Alright, steady on, I’ve just got in here,” George says, but he walks over to Paul and presses some pills and the glass of lukewarm water from his bedside table into his hand. Paul gratefully swallows them, praying the headache away while he waits for the medication to kick in.

“Thanks,” he says hoarsely. George seems to have settled on one of the chairs on the other side of the room, because when he makes a noncommittal noise of _it’s nothing_, it sounds distant.

“You’re a right state,” he remarks.

“Thanks,” Paul repeats, sarcastically this time.

“Anyone’d think you haven’t drunk in years,” George says. He had nearly twice as much as Paul had last night and he was right as rain.

“I haven’t,” Paul says, without thinking, and then immediately backtracks. “I mean, I haven’t drunk like that in years. Not that I haven’t drunk a lot, ‘cause I have, but I haven’t drunk – whatever that stuff was I had yesterday in years.”

“Wine,” George supplies helpfully.

“Right,” Paul says. “Haven’t had that specific wine in years, then.”

“You’re daft,” George says, and Paul can almost hear him shaking his head. “I don’t know what you’re on about half the bloody time.”

“Neither do I, George,” Paul mutters, with feeling. George’s name still feels odd rolling off his tongue. He hasn’t really had the chance to speak to George properly yet, what with the whole oh-shit-I’m-in-1963 thing, and the whole oh-shit-I-have-to-record-an-album-that-I-recorded-already-fifty-seven-years-ago-and-have-now-completely-forgotten thing.

While meandering along that thought, Paul gets a whiff of smoke.

“Hey,” he says sternly, pulled back to reality (if he can even call it that). “You’re not smoking, are you?”

“Christ,” George grumbles, but there’s a hissing sound as the cigarette is stubbed out. “Two weeks ago you nicked a whole pack of fags off me, now you’re on my back every time I look in the direction of a cigarette. Sure you didn’t go in for some brain surgery whilst you were in hospital?”

“They’ll kill you, George,” Paul says, but it comes out more darkly than he’d wanted it to. Fucking headache, stopping him filtering all this time-travel nonsense.

“Alright, bloody hell,” George says, sounding a little taken aback at the tone of Paul’s voice. “It’s out now, happy?”

“You should quit,” Paul says.

“You shouldn’t have drunk so much last night,” George shoots back, and Paul has to concede there. He really shouldn’t have.

“I’ll never drink again,” he vows.

“Aye, and I’ll get to shag Brigitte Bardot one day,” George says. Paul sighs wistfully. That’s one dream he never got to fulfil.

They’re silent for a while, George mulling over his thoughts and Paul desperately bargaining with whatever God there may be to let the paracetamol kick in. After a while, though, the pain starts to ebb around the edges, and Paul trusts himself to open his eyes.

“Hullo,” George says, noticing Paul braving the world like a newborn foal. “Nice of you to join me.” Paul takes his first real good look at George. He looks so different to the last time Paul saw him – the _other_ him, that is. He looks almost healthy; just a little too slim for that to be the case, but he’s not coughing up blood, unable to keep anything down, a cold sweat offsetting his chapped, pale lips.

“You look good,” he says without thinking. George, luckily, just laughs.

“I’m coming for your title as the Cute Beatle,” he says.

“Good luck with that,” Paul says. He blinks a few times as he adjusts to the feeling of being able to have his eyes open without the light searing his retinas.

“You alright, Paul?” George asks after a while.

“Yeah,” Paul says, “head still fucking kills, though.”

“No, I mean-” George starts, and then stops himself. “I mean…generally. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Paul says. He’s not in the mood to have this conversation _again_.

“Just…you’ve been so different since that hospital visit,” George says.

“Christ, I’m still _me_,” Paul says, a little forcefully.

“Alright, bloody hell,” George says. “No need to bite my head off. I’m just worried.” Paul sighs. He’s not being fair.

“I know,” he says. “And I appreciate that, but…I feel like you’re all treating me like I’m made of glass, y’know. I’m not going to break.”

“Who’s ‘all’?” George asks, and then knowingly, “John?” Paul scowls. He hates being easy to read.

“Yes, _John_,” he says. “Thinks I’m losing my mind.”

“Aren’t you?”

“_No_,” Paul says emphatically. “I just-“ he breaks off with a sigh. “Look, it’s complicated.”

“Aye, I can see that,” George says. He pauses, and then adds: “You know we’re always there though, right?”

“I do,” Paul says, and his heart twists, heavy in his chest. God, he misses George. “I miss you,” he blurts. George gives him a funny look.

“I’m right here, you prat,” he says.

“You might not always be,” Paul says.

“I will,” George says, sounding determined. “You’re going to have to try a lot harder than that to get rid of me. Haven’t stopped bothering you since fourth form, have I?” Paul tries for a smile, but it falters on his lips.

“You’ll have to stop smoking if you want that to be the case,” he says. “It’ll give you cancer, y’know.” George rolls his eyes and lights another fag with exaggerated purpose.

“You and your bloody cancer,” he says.

\---------------

Paul decides he should probably get himself a flat in London, since he doesn’t really have a proper place to live and this whole time-travel thing doesn’t seem to be letting up. He opts for renting, knowing his real home will come onto the market in just a few years. He asks Ringo to go flat-hunting with him, because Ringo’s the only person that’ll give him a proper opinion; George’ll find nothing wrong, and John’ll find nothing right.

Ringo, thankfully, doesn’t ask Paul anything about the hospital visit or the weeks since then. He even puts out his cigarette when Paul throws him a baleful look. Besides Ringo’s good nature, it’s easier to spend time with him because he’s not constantly thinking about how or when Ringo’s going to die. It is odd seeing him so much younger, though – Paul had celebrated Ringo’s eightieth birthday with him mere months ago, and now he’s suddenly twenty-three again.

They look around three flats before settling on one of them, a neat little place in Mayfair. It’s a two-bedroom affair, with large windows letting in plenty of light and opening onto Grosvenor Square. Paul’s pleased with how central it is, and likes that there’s an extra room for people to stay in (_John_, the treacherous little voice in his mind supplies helpfully), and a living room for him to work in. Ringo likes the spacious kitchen and the fact that there’s a bathroom _and_ a toilet.

(“Means two people can shit at once,” he says mildly. Paul frowns.

“None of you’ll be shitting in _my _flat,” he says.

“Oh?” Ringo says. “And how are you planning to stop us, eh?”)

The paperwork gets rushed through, since it’s a flat for a _Beatle_, and by the 29th he’s the proud tenant of his first ever (in this world, at least) flat. The first day he’s alone in his new flat, however, is very strange. He hasn’t really been alone since waking up as a twenty-one year old; he’d spent so little time awake on the nights in the hotel room that they don’t count. Now, however, in a sparsely decorated flat in Mayfair, he’s left alone with nothing but his thoughts.

Those thoughts are not things Paul wants to be left alone with right now. He’s had enough of wallowing in misery over the potential loss of his children, uncertainty and fear at what this new (old?) life means, stress at every single move he makes lest he rewrite the future of the entire world. So, he does what he’s always done (or wished he could do) when he’s needed to calm down. He invites John over.

John shows up in record time, and Paul frowns at him when he opens the door.

“Aren’t you supposed to be going back to Cyn and Jules?” he asks.

“You’re the one who invited me here,” John points out. He’s got a guitar slung over his shoulder, Paul notes. 

“Aye, but you didn’t have to come that fast,” Paul says. John looks annoyed.

“D’you want me here or not?” he asks flatly. Paul stands aside to let John in. “Git,” John mutters under his breath as he pushes past.

“Heard that,” Paul shouts after him as he disappears into the living room.

“You were s’posed to,” John calls back. Paul rolls his eyes and follows in John’s wake. 

“So,” John says, already sat on Paul’s only sofa with his feet up on Paul’s little coffee table, guitar sat next to him. Appalling manners. “What’s the occasion? Are we writing?” Paul starts in surprise. There’s always something new catching him out with this whole time travel business, isn’t there? How’s he supposed to write an entire album that he’s already written but has now forgotten? What album even comes after _With The Beatles_?

“Well,” Paul says carefully.

“Don’t tell me, you can’t, and you can’t tell me why,” John says, sounding almost bored. It riles Paul up – he’s not doing this to punish John, but John seems unable to look past his own fucking ego.

“Look, John, I said I’d tell you as much as I could, and I have,” he snaps. “I wish I could tell you, because it’d be a damn sight easier for me to handle if someone else knew about it. But I don’t know what happens if I tell someone, especially you.” 

“What do you mean, especially me?” John asks, an edge of anger already in his voice. “What, are you going to go running to George? Tell Ringo?”

“No!” Paul almost shouts. “I’m not telling fucking _anyone_, because if anyone finds out then- then- then I don’t fucking know what might happen! Everything could change!”

“I just want to know what’s got into you!” John shouts back. “Fuck, it’s like I don’t even know you anymore these past few weeks! You stop smoking, stop eating meat, stop _talking_ to me-”

“I want to!” Paul yells, irate that John’s acting like it’s _Paul’s _fault he can’t tell John what’s going on. “I fucking want to tell you, John, more than anything, but you wouldn’t believe me even if I did, and it could ruin everything!” Fucking hell, in his old age he’d forgotten how much John knew how to push every single button Paul has.

“So fucking _tell me_,” John grits out.

“I. Fucking. Can’t,” Paul hisses back. John throws his hands in the air and sits back on the sofa. This is absolutely not how Paul had ever imagined reunions with John going. There had always been a lot more crying and hugging in his imagination.

“You’re a fucking prick,” John says evenly.

“You’re an egotistical bastard,” Paul shoots back.

“I just want to know what’s going on.”

“You and me both,” Paul mutters.

“Why’d you even invite me over if all you were going to do was shout at me?” John asks.

“I didn’t start the shouting,” Paul says, although he did.

“You did,” John says. Paul sighs.

“Don’t you think I want to tell you, John?” he says. “I’m trying to handle all of it alone, when I don’t even really understand what’s going on. You’re my best friend, of course I want to tell you. But please, trust me when I say I can’t. Not that I won’t, but that I _can’t_.”

“So you _will_ tell me?” John asks. He’s got a strange look on his face.

“Maybe, Christ, I don’t know,” Paul says. “Maybe when I figure it out myself.”

“Well, be sure let me know when that is,” John says sarcastically. Paul physically bites his tongue to stop himself retorting. He’s never been so quick to anger as he is with John.

“Fine,” he says eventually, through gritted teeth. They sit in uncomfortable silence for a moment, both stewing, until-

“So I'm your best friend, eh?” John asks suddenly, sounding far too casual. Paul looks up at him, and his lips quirk up in a smile at the forced nonchalance on John’s face. His tense posture and worried eyes give him away, though. Paul’s always been able to read John.

“Of course you are, you daft git,” Paul says, in slight disbelief that John even has to ask, and John grins, a real smile that reaches his eyes in a way Paul sees too rarely in John. Paul decides to seize the moment. “You know…you’re the best friend I’ll ever have. You complete me in a way that no one else has ever been able to. You’re more important to me than I think I’ll ever fully realise. Y’know, it’s like they say – you don’t know what you have until it’s gone.” John blinks at him.

“What do you mean, gone?” he asks slowly. Paul curses inwardly. _Fuck_. God, he needs to start thinking before he speaks.

“I mean…y’know.” He waves his hands vaguely, hoping John will create some meaning behind what he’s just said other than the obvious.

“I’m here, though,” John says.

“I know that,” Paul says. All his new neighbours probably know that now, too, after that quick row.

“So what do you mean by gone?” John’s not letting this one go. Trust him to pick up on one little throwaway phrase.

“I mean…y’know. One day, we might drift apart, I dunno.” The tension in John's face dissipates and he laughs, easy and carefree.

“Come off it,” he says. “We’re John and Paul, eh? Lennon-McCartney, McCartney-Lennon. We’re stuck together.”

“Yeah,” Paul mumbles, not meeting John’s gaze as he tries to swallow away the bitter taste in his mouth.

“Well, c’mon then,” John says breezily, picking his guitar up and settling it on his lap. “The album’s not going to write itself, y’know.” Paul bloody wishes it would.

“Can we just- not?” he says. “Just for tonight.” John frowns at him.

“Why not?” he asks.

“I’d rather just...” Paul trails off.

“Go on, spit it out," John says.

“Just spend time with you.” John stares at him for a moment, but then he flashes Paul a quick smile as he sets his guitar down again.

“You’ve become a right soft git since that hospital visit,” he remarks. Paul wants to say more, but he thinks John’s probably reached his sentimentality quota for the day.

“Yeah, soft in the head for wanting to spend time with you,” Paul mutters. John laughs.

“You’ve always been soft in the head, Paul,” John says, skilfully dodging the coaster Paul lobs at his head.

\---------------

After a lot of thought, Paul remembers that the album that follows _With The Beatles_ is Hard Day’s Night. If memory serves (and frankly, he’s not entirely sure it does), a lot of that was written in a hotel room in Paris in January of 1964, so he doesn’t need to concern himself too much with the new songs yet.

Paul goes back to Liverpool with John for a few days, wanting to see Cynthia and Julian again. He’s oddly nervous on the way, as though baby Julian will be able to tell that it isn’t _his _Paul, but he’s asleep when Paul drops by. Paul exchanges pleasantries with Cynthia, looking away when John presses a kiss to her forehead and trying not to think of their inevitable messy divorce.

Julian does wake up while Paul’s nursing his tea and chatting with John and Cynthia about the upcoming album release, and Paul offers to take over getting him back to sleep, glad for the chance to be away from the two of them. All he can see when he looks at Cynthia is her crushed face when John tells her it’s over, and it makes him nauseous.

Julian doesn’t calm down when Paul rocks him in his arms and chats softly to him, so Paul starts quietly humming songs. Fragments, mostly, a little bit of Smokey Robinson and Little Richard, and Julian eventually calms down at Paul’s hummed rendition of Hey Jude. Paul carries on rocking him, enjoying the private moment with another human being who can’t judge him, won’t question him.

“Your dad’s being a right pain in my ar- neck right now, y’know,” he says to the sleeping Julian as he gazes out of the window. “Won’t stop asking me what’s going on and getting piss- angry when I won’t tell him. Well, Jules, what am I supposed to say, eh? I’m still Paul, but I’m Paul from the future? Doubt that’ll go down well.” Julian smacks his lips in his sleep. “Last time I saw you you were fifty-seven. Never had kids of your own, though, ‘cause...well.” Paul smiles sadly. “Your dad does love you, though. Just has a really funny way of showing it. Maybe this time around I’ll get through to him, eh? But either way, you’ve always got me. And I don’t have my own kids anymore, so we’ve got each other.” He lapses into silence for a moment, in which Julian makes a noise that sounds very much like a threat to wake up, so Paul starts softly humming We Are The Champions as he rocks the baby in his arms.

“What’s that?” a voice asks from behind him, and Paul whips around in fright to see John silhouetted in the doorway.

“What?” he asks.

“That song,” John says. “Is it new?” Oh, fuck.

“Oh,” Paul says, “uh, no. It’s not mine.”

“Whose is it?” John asks. 

“Dunno,” Paul says unconvincingly. “Forgot.”

“It’s catchy,” John says. “Should sing it to George Martin, he’ll probably know who it is.” He will in thirty years time, Paul thinks.

“Yeah, maybe,” Paul says, hoping his answer is bland enough to make John drop the topic. It works.

“You’re good with him, y’know,” John says, nodding towards Julian still sleeping soundly in Paul’s arms. “I can’t do any of that.”

“You can,” Paul says. “Here, take him.” He holds Julian out to John, but John recoils.

“Nah,” he says. “Can’t do it. He’ll just wake up and cry. Useless father, I am.” He sounds like he’s trying for a joke, but it falls flat.

“C’mere,” Paul says. John hesitates, but Paul gives him a stern look, and he relents and walks over to Paul. “Hold your arms out,” Paul says, and John does so obediently. Paul gently hands Julian over to John, taking a moment to position him properly in John’s arms before stepping back. Julian carries on sleeping.

“There,” he says, “see?”

“Christ,” John says, sounding strained. “What do I do now?” Paul snorts.

“Relax, for a start,” he says. “Try rocking him a bit, he likes that.” Slowly, John starts rocking Julian, who makes a little noise of contentment in his sleep. “See?” Paul says. “Hum something to him, he likes music.”

“Like what?”

“I dunno, you’re a bloody musician,” Paul says. John pauses, and then starts humming. Paul recognises it after a few bars - a slow, sweet version of Twist and Shout. Blimey. Paul starts quietly humming along, growing in confidence when John shoots him a grin. Together, they hum the entire song, even the guitar parts, John twirling around with Julian in his arms when they get to the _ah, ah, ah, ah _part and Paul laughing at him. When they get to the end, John’s grinning, a slight flush to his cheeks. 

“Not so hard, is it?” Paul says gently. John looks at him. “You’ve got the chance to do things differently to them, John.” 

“Aye, but I’ll still fuck it up,” John says, and there’s a note of bitterness in his voice. 

“Everyone fucks it up, mate,” Paul says. “God knows I’ve- uh, I’ve got some friends who have made mistakes. But if you apologise, work on it, show them you love them and you’re going to try, you’re doing alright.” 

“And if I don’t?” John asks, voice barely more than a whisper. “I’m not good at any of that stuff, Paul, you know I’m not. I can’t admit when I’m wrong.”

“Well, you just did it then,” Paul says, and John meets his eye with a smile.

“S’pose I did,” he says, and Paul smiles back.

There, watching John smiling fondly down at baby Julian in his arms, Paul feels something he hasn’t felt in so many decades that it takes him a few seconds to piece it together.

He feels complete.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay this chapter is INCREDIBLY LONG i'm so sorry it wasn't supposed to be but you'll see why

Paul spends a few nights in Liverpool, savouring the time with his father again, and gets incredibly drunk with Mike on Bonfire Night. It’s nice, he thinks, to have his brother back to a proper younger-sibling age – he still can’t quite wrap his head around the fact that his baby brother’s already _seventy-six_. Plus, nothing’s ever changed between him and Mike; it’s just as easy back in 1963 as it is in 2020.

He drops by on the seventh to let John know he’s headed back to London that afternoon, and John says he’ll come back with him, ignoring Cynthia’s disapproving frown and insisting they have work to do. They _should_ get on with some writing, probably, but Paul keeps putting it off, not wanting to worry himself with how he’s going to pretend to write a song he’s already written without arousing John’s suspicions just yet.

Speaking of other things he’s been putting off, the odd phone call to Jane doesn’t seem to be quite cutting it, if the ever more clipped tone of her voice is anything to go by. Paul just can’t be _bothered _to deal with any of that, and he feels a little guilty about it, but he’s just got so much on his plate already that Jane, lovely though she is, is simply a nuisance to him right now. He pushes those thoughts away, though, because there are more important things on his mind.

Brian calls to let them know he’s cancelled the rest of their tour dates until the album’s released, because he’s still concerned about Paul’s health and doesn’t think he should be touring. Paul’s silently grateful, completely out of practice on all of the songs, but knows someone’s told Brian to cancel, because Brian’s pretty relentless with their schedule otherwise. His money’s on George, because John wouldn’t think to tell Brian he was worried and Ringo wouldn’t think of the tour when worrying about Paul.

John stays at Paul’s, without either of them saying anything, because that’s how these things go. Paul can’t ignore the glow in his stomach when John simply hauls his suitcase out of the back of the taxi and follows Paul into his building, though not for lack of trying. He’s sure it’s just because he’s so pleased to have John back at his side, two jagged halves of a whole finally put back together.

John loudly proclaims that he can’t bear to live somewhere so badly decorated, so Paul’s dragged out for a quick shopping trip the next day. This means fighting tooth and nail for every single item of furniture he likes, even though it’s his bloody flat, because John Lennon has taken it upon himself to give new life to the words pig-headed and contrary. Eventually, though, he ends up with a new bed for the guest room, a second sofa and an armchair, a proper dining table with chairs and a hideous pouffe that he had given up trying to talk John out of.

(“That’s staying out of my sight,” he’d said warningly, pointing at the pouffe in John’s arms.

“Aye, well, there’s no accounting for taste,” John had said sniffily, earning himself a kick from Paul.)

Feeling a little more settled in his now-slightly-less-sparsely decorated flat, Paul timidly broaches the topic of songwriting with John.

“Thought you’d never ask,” John says, sounding relieved and picking up his guitar. “I’ve already got a few ideas.”

“Let’s hear them, then,” Paul says, hoping fervently that they’ll sound familiar. What if they don’t and he turns them down, but they were on the album? Then a thought crosses his mind – does John know they’re going to make a film for this album? Has that been decided yet? “Wait, hang on-”

“Well, make your mind up,” John grumbles.

“The next album,” Paul says, “is it, uh, like normal?”

“Well, we decide what it is, don’t we, eh?” John says. “Remember Brian said there’s talk of making a film for it, though.”

“Oh, right, yeah,” Paul says, thankful that John’s answered his question without him even having to ask it.

“Right,” John says. “I’ve got a bit of one I think is quite good…” He starts humming a vague melody as he strums, and Paul’s extremely glad to find he recognises it as a very rough version of Any Time At All.

“I like that,” he says. “You should put a middle eight in.” He remembers that being his contribution to the song the first time round, and he was definitely right to do so.

“Nah,” John says. “It flows nicely as it is.”

“No,” Paul presses, “you really should. Here, pass.” He motions for John to pass the guitar over, and John obliges. “Look, if you just-” he strums a little, playing what he vaguely remembers the melody being, and John leans back.

“That’s alright,” he relents. High praise from John Lennon. “You got any words for that?”

“Why not just keep it instrumental?” Paul says. John considers that for a moment, then nods.

“Alright,” he says. “Hang on, pass it back.” Paul hands the guitar back over. “So was it like this?” John plays a rough rendition of what Paul had played. Paul scrunches up his nose, trying to recall exactly how it went.

“I think it should have another little bit after the- here, give me,” Paul stretches his hand out for the guitar.

“Where’s your guitar, eh?” John says. “How are we s’posed to write a song with all this to-ing and fro-ing?”

“Liverpool,” Paul says. He hadn’t thought to bring it down with him after his last visit, mind not on music for once in his life, but he makes a mental note to call and have it sent down. Feeling the fretboard under his fingers again makes him itch to keep playing and never stop.

“Alright,” John says. “C’mere.” Paul frowns at him. “Come ‘ead. You can sit behind me, and we can play together.”

“You play the wrong way round,” Paul points out. John rolls his eyes.

“You make life so bloody difficult,” he says. “I’m sure you can handle it. You’re a _Beatle_, after all.” It’s Paul’s turn to roll his eyes, but he picks himself up and walks over to John, stepping onto the sofa and sitting down cross-legged right behind him, hooking his head over John’s shoulder so he can see the guitar. It doesn’t come naturally to him, playing this way around, but he’s done it before, so he thinks he can manage.

“Play it again, then,” he says. John does, and Paul stops him. “Now, see,” he says, snaking his arms around John’s waist and over the guitar. “This’d sound better.” John lets go of the guitar, and his fingers brush Paul’s for a second as they fall from the fretboard. It makes Paul’s heart beat a little faster. Probably just because he’s not been this close to John in decades, he thinks. It’s likely just excitement.

“Mm,” John hums as Paul plays. “What about if you go up at the end of this bit, instead of down?” His hands find their way back to the guitar, and Paul’s drop off. He’s acutely aware of John around him, John’s back pressed against his chest, John’s shoulder on his chin, John’s hair against his ear. He’s so warm, so _alive_, chest rising and falling with every breath.

“Paul?” John’s voice startles him out of his reverie.

“Sorry,” Paul says. “Got lost thinking about where we could take it. Play it again.” John does, and Paul’s hands immediately go back to the guitar. “No, no, try it like this,” he says.

“Oh, right,” John says, and repeats what Paul’s just played perfectly. Paul beams. Maybe this whole songwriting business won’t be as hard as he’d thought.

“Exactly,” Paul says. John hums, mind on the music. Paul feels it reverberating through his own body and shivers involuntarily. John stops playing, and turns his head to look at Paul, leaning back a little so he can focus.

“Hello,” Paul says. John’s hazel eyes blink at him, and Paul’s stomach twists in a not-entirely unpleasant manner. He can see all of John within those eyes, the only weak spot in the hard shell of a soft man.

“Hello,” John says. His eyes look soft, fond, _happy_. Paul’s heart soars at the thought that it’s being with _Paul _that’s made John feel this way. He supposes it’s because in his world, John hadn’t cared about him like that at the end.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Paul says, overcome by a burst of emotion. John’s lips quirk up in a smile.

“I’m glad I’m here too,” he says. They both grin at each other for a moment, until John snaps back into business-mode. “Right, well,” he says, slapping the guitar. “These songs won’t write themselves, and some of us have a family to support.”

Paul pushes down the stinging pain in his chest at that, and simply nods, flashing a smile at John before putting his hands back on the wood of the fretboard.

\---------------

John and Paul spend about a week like that, living in each other’s pockets and playing together, made a lot easier when Paul gets his guitar the next day. It makes Paul feel more alive than he’s felt in _years_, probably since the late sixties, because he’s finally _whole_. He’s got John back, he’s writing with John, and that’s how things are supposed to be. Trying to make music without him had always felt like trying to reach the centre of a maze while blindfolded; possible, but only if he really felt his way around.

Ringo and George visit a few times, together and separately, because the four of them aren’t used to being apart yet and still don’t like it. Paul wishes they had mobile phones – God, how he misses mobile phones – because he’d love to have a group chat with them. In fact, he’d love to see what John would be like with a mobile phone. He’d either absolutely love it and never set it down, or hate it and refuse to play along. John never does things like that by halves.

One day, when Ringo’s visiting, John pops out for a walk, claiming he gets claustrophobic if he’s shut inside all day. Paul thinks almost spitefully of the week-long bed-in, and then feels a little guilty. _That’s not this John,_ the little voice in his head says sensibly. Yet, Paul adds on darkly.

“You seem different,” Ringo remarks mildly, as Paul’s making him a cup of tea in the kitchen.

“Eh?” Paul says, handing him the mug. Ringo takes it, leaning back against the kitchen counter and blowing on the drink.

“Calmer,” he says. “More sure of yourself. Less proud.” Paul snorts. He supposes that he’s certainly not as fiery as he actually had been at twenty-one, but Christ, he’s been here nearly eight decades now – anyone who isn’t any milder in old age has probably done it wrong.

“Is that so,” he says, amused.

“Can’t quite put my finger on it,” Ringo says, taking a sip of his tea. “You notice us more, now, too.”

“Eh?” Paul says again. “What d’you mean?” Ringo shrugs.

“Y’know,” he says. “You’re always so caught up in being John-and-Paul that you forget about me and George.” The words are harsh, but Ringo doesn’t mean it as a value judgement. It’s simply an observation.

“I know,” Paul says, with a pang of guilt. “I’m trying to do better, not take you for granted, y’know.”

“Oh, don’t,” Ringo says, waving him away. “You two need each other. You’re like the moons to each other’s oceans.” Paul doesn’t really know what to say to that.

“You’re my best mate too, Ringo,” he settles on.

“I know,” Ringo says. “But you two are something different. If one of you were a woman I’d call you soulmates.” Paul feels a little funny at the words.

“Come off it,” he says.

“I’m serious,” Ringo says, and then placidly, “y’know…even though you’re not a woman, I’d probably still call you soulmates.”

“I don’t believe in soulmates,” Paul says. “There’s not one person there for you in life, y’know. What if I’d moved to New Zealand as a kid, eh? I’d still find someone to love there.” Ringo shoots Paul a knowing look.

“Aye,” he says, “but there’s always going to be one person whose absence you feel more than anyone else’s, and that’s your soulmate.”

Paul opens his mouth, but finds he has nothing to say. Luckily, John chooses that moment to come bursting in through the front door, soaking wet and shouting about the weather, and Paul gladly turns his attention to shouting at him for dripping all over his floorboards.

That night, though, when he’s trying to get to sleep, Paul’s head won’t stop spinning, Ringo’s words echoing in his mind.

He’s loved and lost a lot of people in his life. John, Brian, George, Linda…Paul could draw up a sizeable list, frankly. He’s learnt to go on without all of them, but there’s only one whose loss he’s never truly recovered from, and that’s John.

John. Something’s always inextricably tied the two of them together, even when they were an ocean apart. Paul’s never known _quite _what to do with himself when John hasn’t been there, and John’s never _quite_ been able to get by without Paul by his side. He’s never felt complete without John, but that was a creative thing, missing his muse, his creative partner, his best friend. Wasn’t it?

The idea that he doesn’t _know_ anymore scares him. More, perhaps, than the thought of losing John again does. That’s at least something familiar – he’s lost John twice before, and dealt with it. Paul knows what life is like without John, knows how to grit his teeth and carry on. But to suddenly be questioning what John is to him when he’s always been so sure – muse, creative partner, best friend – is _terrifying_.

But then, he supposes, what’s a soulmate? Maybe ‘soulmate’ is just Ringo’s way of summing up in one word what Paul had always categorised separately – muse, creative partner, best friend. He’s certainly not in _love _with John, not like he was with Linda, for example. Yes, he thinks, in that way, perhaps they _are_ ‘soulmates’, if that’s what a soulmate is. Paul is his music, and his music is John, so it stands to reason that without John Paul’s incomplete. It’s simply a funny word to choose. Perhaps ‘partner’ would be better.

Paul rolls onto his side, satisfied that he’s thought his way through that, and his satisfaction is loud enough that he can ignore the slight undertone of relief at having found a suitable explanation for Ringo’s words and Paul’s confusion at them.

As Paul’s drifting to sleep, already halfway there, the little voice in his mind speaks up again.

_If you’re not in love with John, why are you so afraid?_

\---------------

The album is due to be released on the twenty-second, and they’ve already been skiving off on their tour dates due to Paul’s ‘illness’, but Brian’s firm that as soon as the album’s out their unforgiving tour will start up again. The final week leading up to the album’s release is spent rehearsing, which Paul is incredibly grateful for. He’s even more grateful that, with no questions asked, John carries on their early-start late-finish procedure from the album recordings and brings him up to speed on the songs on the set list. It doesn’t take that long, though, since most of the songs are songs that Paul played way beyond the sixties, so there’s only a few he’s really rusty on. He astonishes John by absolutely flying through She Loves You, but refuses to answer any questions on how he knows all of that but couldn’t even sing the chorus of There’s A Place.

Album release days are always hectic, although less so in 1963 when there’s no social media to be checking up on, and the numbers come in through the phone. The four of them head to a record store, though, with Mal in tow to keep the screaming hordes away, and all buy a copy of their latest release. It feels like déjà-vu to be stood in a record shop, clutching a big record in his hands, grinning at the others with a sense of _we did this_ (although the déjà-vu itself isn’t so different from the last month and a half of his life, he supposes).

Brian lets them go home after a series of interviews in the late-morning and early afternoon, in which Paul elects not to speak much, lest he say something that changes the course of history, or whatever. George, Ringo and John all notice, but none of them say anything to him, and Paul feels a surge of fondness for them for it.

When Paul and John get back to Paul’s flat, John heads straight for the telephone. He likes to stay updated on exactly how many records are being sold and exactly where – why, Paul doesn’t know, because it makes him incredibly snappy and nervous, but John likes to know everything to do with his music. Paul thinks it could be because John pours himself into his music, and so the success of the music is the only way he can value himself. The thought makes his heart ache in a strange way, as though he were experiencing the same pain as John, but second-hand.

Paul, however, chooses to go and sit in the living room, curling up on the sofa with a spy book George had left for him to read to the muted soundtrack of John snapping at some poor bloke on the phone in the hallway.

It’s actually a pretty good book, Paul thinks, pleasantly surprised as he immerses himself in the plot. He’s never read much John le Carré, never really been one for James Bond and all those Cold War spy narratives, but then again, he never really took much time to give them a try in his first life.

He’s about a quarter of the way through the book when the door to the living room flies open, hitting the wall with a bang. Paul looks up to see John standing in the doorway, a funny look on his face.

“What?” he asks.

“JFK’s just died,” John says, sounding oddly strangled.

“Oh, right,” Paul says, and then remembers he’s supposed to be shocked. “I mean, that’s terrible. How did it happen?”

“Paul,” John says again.

“Aye?”

“You said he’d die this year.” 

Oh, _fuck_.

“John,” Paul says nervously. How the _fuck_ is he going to explain this away?

“Look,” John says, coming into the room and shutting the door behind him, glancing around the room furtively as though a _Times _reporter could be hidden behind the hideous pouffe that John had placed in the living room and Paul hadn’t had the heart to remove. “I don’t need to know the details, but if you need help with anything, just say the word.”

“What?” Paul says after a beat. He’s thrown; this isn’t at all where he thought this conversation would be going.

“Y’know, if you need anything burnt, or covered, or hidden,” John says.

“Why would I need that?”

“I don’t know, I don’t know how these things work, do I?” John says. “I’ll do whatever you need me to, give you an alibi, and all. Just…tell me what you need.” Paul stares at him for a moment, utterly baffled, until it suddenly dawns on him.

“Oh my God,” he says, and then he bursts out laughing.

“What?” John says, bemused, and then, “_what_?” in annoyance when Paul can’t stop.

“Bloody hell, John,” Paul giggles, wiping tears from his eyes. “You think I was part of a plot to kill Kennedy?” John looks somewhere between flabbergasted and outraged.

“Well- what the hell am I supposed to make of it, eh? You tell me he’s going to die, and he dies! How else would you know that unless you were involved?”

“What would I want to kill Kennedy for?” Paul asks, between peals of laughter.

“I don’t bloody know, do I!” John says, sounding scandalised. Paul wipes his eyes again, sporadic giggles still erupting from his lips.

“Bloody hell,” he says. “You’re a fucking loon, Lennon.” John scowls at him.

“Fuck you,” he says. Paul grins.

“You were going to cover up the conspiratorial murder of the President of the United States for me,” he says. The thought makes him giddy, somehow.

“Yeah,” John says, trying for humorous bravado. “Doubt your jailhouse music would keep my bills paid.” Paul’s still grinning.

“You’re a soft git,” he says fondly. Colour creeps into John’s cheeks.

“Aye, well,” he says. “You’re my Paul, aren’t you? Need you around to keep me in check.”

“That you do,” Paul says, “and that I am.” They grin at each other for a moment, Paul savouring the giddy, heady feeling of _John was going to cover up the murder of the US President for me_.

“He got shot, y’know,” John says after a moment.

“Oh, aye?” Paul says.

“Right American crime, that is,” John says, and Paul swallows away the bitter taste that rises in his mouth. “Wouldn’t get shot here, would you?”

“No, just stabbed outside the pub,” Paul says. John grins.

“Now that’s a proper way to die,” he says, walking over to the pouffe and sitting down. Paul rolls his eyes. 

“So,” John says, and Paul doesn’t like the look of that glimmer in his eyes. “How _did _you know he was going to die?” Paul’s mood drops like a lead balloon.

“I didn’t,” he tries.

“Right,” John says. “Absolute coincidence, that is. I often accurately predict the death of state leaders, y’know.” Paul sighs.

“I can’t tell you,” he says. It’s John’s turn to roll his eyes.

“Come off it,” he says. “You predicted the future. You been taking something? Seeing a psychic, I dunno?”

“You don’t believe in any of that shit,” Paul says.

“I don’t believe in predicting the future, but you did it,” John says shrewdly. “So I want to know how.” Paul bites his lip. He can’t tell him, can he? It’ll probably change things, if John knows he’s from the future. But it’d help so much, if John knew. He’d have someone to confide in, someone to help him, someone to lean on. In fact, he could probably help make Paul’s behaviour less suspicious to everyone else. But then again…Paul doesn’t know the rules of time travel, but he’s pretty sure telling anyone is against them.

“I can’t,” he says, after a moment.

“I’m not taking that as an answer, Paul,” John says.

“John, I _can’t_,” Paul says, a note of desperation in his voice. “You wouldn’t believe me, anyway.”

“Try me. I’m very open minded, y’know.”

“I _can’t_,” Paul says again. “I want to, John, I do, but I _can’t_.”

“Paul,” John says very seriously. “Have you been abducted by aliens?”

“What?” Paul says, bemused. “No.”

“Well, fuck,” John sighs. “That was my best guess.” To be fair, he’s not that far off. Time travel’s probably among his other guesses, if alien abduction is his top pick.

That thought makes Paul stop in his tracks. Maybe, he thinks, maybe, it’s not breaking the rules of time travel if he doesn’t _tell _John. If John figures it out on his own, maybe it won’t split the universe in half, or whatever might happen if Paul tells him. After all, it’s not on Paul at that point, is it? John will have worked it out all by himself, and what can Paul do about that?

His heart is suddenly beating so fast and so hard that he can feel it in his chest, hands sweaty and cold. There are a thousand thoughts vying to be at the forefront of his mind – is this a good idea? How will John react? Will John believe him? But most of all, circling around and around, _you’re not going to be alone anymore_.

“What were your other guesses?” he asks tentatively. John looks at him for a moment.

“Will you tell me if I’m right?” he says. “Pointless, otherwise, y’see.” Paul bites his lip.

“I’ll tell you if you’re wrong,” he decides. That way, he thinks, he’s sticking to not _telling_ John, he’s just informing him by omission. That must fit into his loophole theory.

“Alright,” John says, sounding slightly wary, as if Paul’s playing a trick on him. Paul bloody wishes he were. “You’re Paul’s long-lost identical twin.”

“No,” Paul says. “I don’t have a twin. Just me.” John looks incredibly disappointed, and Paul considers for a moment whether or not he should feel offended.

“You’re a clone of the real Paul.”

“No,” Paul says. “I’m the real Paul.”

“You saw the future when you blacked out after my birthday.” Paul scrunches his nose up, considering. Trust John to come up with something that’s _almost _right but not quite, meaning Paul has to carefully consider what he says next.

“No,” he says eventually.

“You’re _from _the future,” John says.

Paul says nothing. He doesn’t think he could, anyway, even if he wanted to, because his heart and stomach and lungs are all in his mouth.

There’s a moment of absolutely stunned, incredibly loud silence, broken by a burst of John’s laughter.

“You almost had me, y’know,” he says. “From the future, my arse.”

Paul says nothing.

“Paul,” John says. “Joke’s over.”

Paul says nothing.

“Paul,” John says slowly.

“John,” Paul says, and his voice is shaky.

“You’re not…from the future,” John says. “Time travel isn’t real.”

“How’d I know about Kennedy dying, then?” Paul says. He’s still trembling. He’s got more adrenaline coursing through his veins than he thinks he’s ever had in his body his whole life.

“I dunno, but…” John trails off. “Time travel isn’t _possible_.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Paul says. He can barely get the words out.

“Are you having a mental breakdown?” John asks. A manic bubble of laughter escapes Paul’s lips.

“No,” he says.

“But time travel…you can’t _really _think you time travelled.” John looks worried, now. Fuck. This was a mistake.

“John,” Paul says, and he can hear that he’s begging. “Please. I said you wouldn’t believe me. I- I don’t understand it, either. I fell asleep…there, and I woke up here. But I’m not going insane. I _swear _to you, John. I’m not crazy.” John laughs, but it’s humourless and doesn’t reach his eyes.

“Sounds like something a crazy person would say,” he says, not tearing his gaze away from Paul’s.

“I don’t know what else to tell you,” Paul says, pleadingly. He hadn’t even known how much he’d wanted John to believe him until right now, with a crushing, sickening wave of disappointment threatening to crash over him.

“You’re still Paul?” John says.

“Yes,” Paul says.

“What year are you from?” Paul’s makeshift rules of time travel are out of the window. All he wants now, all he _needs_, is John to believe him. He can’t have John think he’s insane, pull away from him, take him back to hospital, distance himself. He just fucking _can’t_.

“2020.” John lets out a little gasp.

“Fucking Christ,” he says. “You’d be seventy-eight in 2020.”

“I am,” Paul says. He watches John’s eyes flit over his body, and knows what he’s thinking. Paul’s not seventy-eight. Time travel isn’t real. Paul should go back to hospital.

“Paul,” John says. “You’re not seventy-eight. Time travel’s not _real_. Maybe you should go back to hospital.”

“Then how did I know Kennedy was going to die, John?” Paul says. “A mental breakdown doesn’t explain that.” He’s desperate now. “And- and I know how he died. He got shot, in a motorcade in Texas. Dallas, I think. And the guy they’re going to take down for it is called Lee Harvey Oswald, and he’s going to get shot by someone else in a few days. _Fuck_, I can’t remember that guy’s name, though.”

“You could’ve heard that from someone,” John says, but he’s sounding a little less sure now.

“And our album, it’s going to be a number one. And…and remember, I knew All My Loving but not half the rest of the songs? That’s because All My Loving’s going to be a hit. I Want to Hold Your Hand is, too.”

“That’s just guesswork,” John says, teetering on the brink of unsure.

“And…fuck, what else happens in 1963? Christ, I don’t fucking know, has Churchill retired yet? Have they apprehended people for the Great Train Robbery yet?”

“Those are things that are bound to happen,” John says, but he’s definitely in ‘unsure’ territory now.

“Christ, alright,” Paul says, desperately. In for a penny, in for a pound. “Churchill’s going to die in 1965, and England win the World Cup in 1966.”

“How am I supposed to check that?” John says. “You could be talking absolute nonsense, and I won’t know for two years.”

“Fuck, John, what do you want? I’m seventy-eight, I don’t remember everything that happened sixty years ago! Christ, I don’t know, your book’s going to be called In His Own Write!” Paul says, throwing his hands up in the air.

John blinks at him.

“I was going to call it that,” he says slowly.

“Yeah,” Paul says. “I know.”

There’s a moment of incredibly tense silence.

“Okay,” John says. “Let’s say you’re telling the truth.”

“I _am_,” Paul grits out.

“Let’s say you are,” John presses on. “What do we do? How do I swap you back with my Paul?” That feels like a slap in the face.

“I _am _your Paul,” Paul says. “I’m just…older.”

“Aye,” John says. “And I want young Paul back.”

“Why?” Paul says. “I’m him. He’s me. We’re- I’m- we’re both Paul.”

“You’re a different Paul,” John says. “How would you like it if John in your world got replaced by me, eh?”

Paul swallows.

“You’d still be John,” he says. John doesn’t seem to be listening though.

“Hang on,” he says, as though the thought has only just occurred to him. “What am _I _like in the future?”

“What happened to not believing me?” Paul says.

“Let’s say I still don’t,” John says. “Just want to know.”

“You’re still John,” Paul says.

“Is that all?”

“That’s all I’m telling you.” John leans back on the pouffe.

“Alright,” he says. “Let’s make a deal.” Paul’s guard is immediately up. Deals with John Lennon are never in anyone’s favour but his.

“Depends what it is,” Paul says.

“You say our album goes to number one, and I Want to Hold Your Hand is a hit.”

“A number one,” Paul says.

“Right. And the guy who shot Kennedy-”

“-Lee Harvey Oswald-”

“-right, yeah, him, he’s going to get shot in a few days.”

“Yes.”

“Here’s the deal,” John says. “If that happens, all of that, then I’ll believe you.”

“And if it doesn’t?” Paul’s suddenly overcome with fear. Maybe telling John has shifted the universe so that now it _won’t_ happen. What’s it they call it, the butterfly effect?

“If it doesn’t, you go back to hospital.” Paul weighs the options up. There’s no going back from what he’s told John now, so he doesn’t really have a choice. If he says yes, there’s a slight chance he could end up back in hospital. If he says no, John’ll have him sectioned for certain.

“Alright,” Paul says heavily. “Deal.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: some period typical homophobia in here !

The next day, they’re squashed in a car travelling up to Newcastle. John’s got his overly-blithe front up and they all know it, but no one says anything. Paul doesn’t want to, and Ringo and George don’t dare. Paul sees them exchanging looks, knows what they’re thinking – _something’s wrong with mum and dad_ – and chooses to spend the car journey staring out of the window instead of engaging in conversation, claiming carsickness when they try to get him to join in. He misses smartphones and MP3 players – fuck, even a Walkman would be great right now, anything to completely drown out the falsely casual conversation going on next to him.

He’d never even _considered _the fact that John wouldn’t want him. The rejection stings more the longer Paul dwells on it, but he can’t help himself. _He’s _Paul, John’s Paul, _the _Paul. He was here in 1963, and he’s here again now. So what if he’s lived out a few decades in between? He’s still fundamentally the same person. He’s still Paul, the only Paul that John has and will ever know. There _is _no other Paul. But John wants another Paul, a Paul that Paul’s not entirely sure even exists anymore. Unless…but surely not. But then again, Paul thinks, he doesn’t know how he ended up here in the first place; who is he to dictate the rules of time travel? Maybe the other Paul, the younger Paul, is in real Paul’s place in 2020.

Luckily, Paul doesn’t have time to think himself into a frenzy because they’re pulling up at a hotel and tumbling out of the car, pushing through throngs of screaming girls to get to the front door.

“Bloody hell,” George says when they get inside, brushing off his arm. “You think they even know we’re human beings too?”

“Speak for yourself,” John says.

“What the fuck are you then, eh?” Ringo asks mildly, beelining for the lift. The other three follow, not wanting to be stuck in the foyer any longer than necessary.

“A god,” John says airily. Paul, despite his better judgement, rolls his eyes. John catches him, and for a split second it looks like he’s about to make an acidic, witty comment, but instead he looks away, turning his attention to Brian, who’s hurrying towards the lift.

“Two rooms,” he says when he gets in, pressing the button for the fifth floor. They know the drill.

“I’m with George,” John says as the lift whirrs to life. Paul tries his best to ignore the sinking feeling in his stomach, and the hot flare of anger that swiftly follows.

“Poor George,” he says instead, but it comes out bitter.

“Poor _you_, mate,” George says, nodding at Paul. “At least I’ll get a good night’s sleep. You won’t with that chainsaw next to you.”

“Oi,” Ringo says mock-indignantly, shoving his shoulder against George’s, who falls into John, who falls into Brian, who falls into Paul, and they all stumble in the cramped lift. The doors open with a _ding _at that precise moment, so Paul tumbles out of the lift and grabs the nearest arm behind him to steady his grip. It jerks out of his grasp as soon as he’s steady, and Paul doesn’t even need to look up to know who it is.

“Right,” John says loudly, rubbing at his arm like it’s been burnt. “C’mon, George.” And he stalks off without another look in Paul’s direction. Brian, of course, follows him, like a fucking puppy, and Paul feels a wave of guilt wash over the bitterness and sadness that’s been chewing at him all day.

“Alright?” Ringo says. Paul realises he’s just watching John, George and Brian walk into the distance, and shakes himself back into reality.

“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, sorry.”

“We’re 503,” Ringo says, nodding at a door a few down to their left. Paul throws one last glance down the right-hand corridor at the three other men, then tears his gaze away and follows Ringo into the room. There are two single beds, which is a luxury they don’t always get, and Paul throws himself onto one with only a hint of melodrama.

“Are we going to talk about it?” Ringo asks after a moment.

“About what?” Paul says, feigning ignorance.

“You’n John.”

“What about us?”

“If you don’t want to talk about it, we won’t,” Ringo says. “But I’m not having you two flounce around like this. You sort yourselves out.”

“It’s not up to me,” Paul mumbles, pressing the heels of his palms into his eyes. 

“Oh aye, I know John’s difficult, but you’re no angel, mate,” Ringo says. “Won’t kill you to apologise first, y’know.”

“Got nothing to apologise for,” Paul mutters.

“Then what is it, eh?” Ringo asks. Paul sighs.

“I can’t explain it,” he says. “Just…there’s nothing I can do about it. Told him the truth about something, and he doesn’t believe me.”

“So make him believe it,” Ringo says, with a shrug.

“I tried,” Paul says. “Tried every which way I knew.”

“Try harder,” Ringo suggests.

“You’d make a shite therapist,” Paul remarks, staring up at the ceiling.

“If it’s that important to you that he believes it, don’t stop trying to convince him,” Ringo continues, ignoring Paul’s comment. Probably for the best, Paul thinks, since that might actually be decent advice.

“Maybe,” Paul says absent-mindedly, considering the idea.

How does one go about convincing their best friend that they’re from the future?

\-------------------------------------

The show in Newcastle that evening, to Paul’s surprise, goes well. He’d forgotten just how bloody loud the shows were, though, although it’s in his favour when he slips up a few times, the muscle memory not quite there yet. He feels John’s eyes on him for a split second every time, burning a hole into the side of his head, but when he looks up to meet John’s eyes John’s back to smiling at the crowd he can’t even see.

After the show, they mill around in the dressing room for a while, because their car is stuck in traffic somewhere. Paul strips off his suit jacket and rolls up his sleeves, wiping the sweat from his face with the sleeve of his jacket because he’s fucking twenty-one and can be as disgusting as he likes. Brian throws him a disparaging look, but doesn’t say anything. He’s seen them all covered in their own vomit and piss – fuck, each _other’s_ vomit and piss – so a little sweat won’t kill him.

“I’m off for a smoke,” George says decidedly when Paul flops down in a chair. “Ringo, Brian, you coming?”

“Why not just smoke in here?” Ringo asks, looking bemused. George shoots him a meaningful look.

“It’s just a bit claustrophobic, in’t it?” George says.

“Not really,” Ringo says. “It’s bloody November in Newcastle, what d’you want to go outside for?”

“Fresh air is good for you,” George says. He’s wiggling his eyebrows at Ringo now. “Come ‘ead. Brian? Coming?”

“If I must,” Brian says, with a long-suffering sigh. George grins and claps him on the shoulder.

“You must,” he says.

“I’ll come,” John says, feeling around in his pockets for his cigarettes.

“No, you stay,” George says. “Don’t want too many people outside. Plus, need someone here in case the car comes.”

“Paul’ll be here,” John says, without even looking at Paul. “He’s not ‘bout to come out for a fag, is he, now?”

“No,” Paul says testily. “Seen enough people die from those things to last a lifetime.” John stills for a second, barely perceptible to anyone who wasn’t watching him.

“Twenty-one’s hardly a lifetime,” he shoots back.

“You’re staying here,” George says, pointing at John. “Paul needs company. And you need proper supervision. We’ll be back.” With that, he turns on his heel and marches out of the door. Ringo follows, and Brian shoots them both an apologetic and simultaneously meaningful glance as he shuts the door behind them.

John lights a cigarette flippantly, as though he’s daring Paul to say something. Paul’s not going to give him that satisfaction.

“Right,” John says, when the silence between them becomes unbearable. “Say it, then.”

“Say what?”

“Whatever you’ve been _dying _to say to me all day,” John says. Paul hates him, just a little bit.

“I don’t know why you’re being such a fucking prick,” he blurts.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” John says, blasé.

“You bloody well do,” Paul says. “I’m fucking _me_, John. Me. James Paul McCartney.”

“Aye,” John says, taking a drag of his smoke. Paul waits for him to say something else, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t look at Paul, either.

“You’re a bastard, Lennon,” Paul says. “I confided in you. _You_.” He emphasises the last word, trying to get everything across in the singular syllable – _I told you, no one else, I don’t want to tell anyone else, I want you to believe me, I _need _you to believe me_.

“We have a deal,” John says, tipping his head back and exhaling smoke towards the ceiling.

“Deal didn’t involve you being a _git _to me,” Paul says.

“Well, pardon me if I don’t pretend like everything’s fine when my best mate’s either gone insane or been replaced by a _seventy-eight year old_,” John says. The words sting, and Paul recoils. Why does it make such a difference to John? He’s still _Paul_.

“Why’s it matter how old I am?” Paul says.

“You’re not _my _Paul if you’re seventy-eight, are you?” John says. “You might be _a _Paul, in Paul’s body, but you’re not _Paul_. You’re a stranger.”

Paul’s stunned into silence.

“A _stranger_?” he says, and his voice sounds strangled. John lets out a last exhalation of smoke, stubs out his cigarette, and nods, finally turning to look at Paul.

“If you’re from the future, then I don’t know you,” John says coolly. “And I don’t want to know you. I want you to go back where you came from, and the real Paul to come back.”

“I’m the real fucking Paul,” Paul says. He doesn’t know how many more times he can say it.

“You’re not the same,” John says. “Everyone can see you’ve not been the same since that night. You’re calmer, more honest, more open, less stubborn-”

“Those are all _good _things,” Paul interjects hotly.

“Not to me,” John says. “They make Paul Paul.” Paul feels a sharp stab of fury grip him – _he’s _fucking Paul! Who the fuck is _John _to tell him what makes him him?

“Right,” Paul says, sounding a lot calmer than he feels, and looking to inflict equal damage. “Y’know, of all people, I never thought _you’d_ let me down, John.” A flash of something crosses John’s face – hurt? – but it’s gone as soon as it comes, replaced by a hard, stony look.

“You don’t even know me,” John says coldly.

“Maybe you’re right,” Paul spits bitterly, trying to quell the rising bile and panic in his throat. “Maybe I fucking don’t.”

He gets up, feeling sick and woozy and just needing to get _out_, away from John, and smacks straight into George as he opens the door.

“What’s going on?” George says, sounding bewildered. Paul says nothing, just pushes past him and heads down the corridor, not knowing where the fuck he’s going, just needing to get _out_.

He somehow makes his way through the maze of corridors into the fresh air, gulping it in like he’s just breached the surface of water after almost drowning. It feels like drowning, this thing with John, because John’s on the verge of leaving him, _again_. Paul knows this sinking, sickening feeling, knows it all too well, but this time he has no one to support him; no Linda to hold him against her chest as he weeps.

“Fuck,” he mumbles, tipping his head back against the wall and squeezing his eyes shut, as if it’s somehow going to stop the swirling panic rising inside him in its tracks. He doesn’t even hear the door bursting open behind him, jumping when he feels a tentative hand on his shoulder.

“Paul?” It’s Brian. Paul keeps his eyes closed. He thinks he might throw up if he sees another living dead person right now.

“Mm?” Paul hums.

“Are you alright?”

“Yeah, ‘m great,” Paul mumbles.

“What’s going on?” Brian sounds concerned. Paul feels a stab of guilt find its way through the haze of panic.

“Nothing,” Paul says. “Just don’t feel well, ‘s all.”

“I mean with you and John,” Brian says. Paul shrugs.

“Dunno,” he says dully. It’s the truth; he doesn’t.

“Well, are you still going to be able to play?” Typical Brian, always thinking about the next show.

“Yeah,” Paul says, and can almost hear Brian relax beside him.

“Is there anything I can do?” he asks. Paul shakes his head.

“Don’t think there’s even anything _I _can do,” Paul says, with a humourless laugh.

“You’ll work it out,” Brian says reassuringly.

“What makes you so sure?” Paul mutters.

“You’re John and Paul,” Brian says, as though it were the simplest thing in the world.

“That’s why we’re in this situation,” Paul says.

“And that’s also why I know you’ll get yourselves out of it,” Brian says. Somehow, his confidence is soothing, calming Paul’s frantic nerves.

“Maybe,” Paul allows.

“I _know_,” Brian repeats. “The car’s here now, come on.” Paul sighs and opens his eyes, taking a moment to drink in the light-polluted sky before grudgingly following Brian back into the venue. Brian’s confident words follow him all the way to the car.

_You’ll work it out. You’re John and Paul_.

But that hasn’t always been the case, has it?

\-------------------------------------

It’s one in the morning, and Paul can’t sleep.

It might be Ringo’s snores that are probably beyond legal decibel levels, or it might be the thoughts chasing each other around Paul’s mind, or it might be the niggling feeling that always gets that means he can’t quite sleep when he and John are on bad terms.

Either way, Paul thinks, a midnight stroll will probably do him good. The front of the hotel’s no good, since the fans know they’re in there and there’s always some who camp outside, but the back should be alright. He thinks there might even be a little terrace, if he’s not mistaken.

He’s shivering by the time he gets out there, having massively underestimated how chilly even _indoors _is on a November night in Newcastle, but the fresh air on his face is like a cool caress, and he tilts his face into the breeze, eyes fluttering shut.

“Can’t sleep?” a voice asks, and Paul’s eyes snap open to see John standing outside, looking ridiculous in his pyjamas and a suit jacket on top. John has the decency to flash him a rueful smile, and Paul returns it hesitantly.

“No,” he says. “You either?”

“Just fancied the possibility of my balls freezing off,” John says.

“Very enticing prospect,” Paul agrees. John grins, but it falters. They stand in silence for a minute, Paul shivering more with every passing second until he can’t stop his teeth chattering.

“You’re a bloody loon, coming out here without a coat,” John mutters.

“N-nah,” Paul shivers, “I’m ‘a-‘ard, I am.” John rolls his eyes, and in two strides he’s at Paul’s side, radiating warmth into Paul’s frozen limbs, and a jacket is being draped over Paul’s shoulders.

“Y-you’re going to be c-cold, now,” Paul says pointedly, trying to shrug the jacket off. John’s hands clamp down on it, and he shakes his head.

“I’ll be alright for a bit,” he says.

“Th-thanks,” Paul says, rubbing his hands together under the jacket to try and warm them up a little.

“Almost makes you miss Liverpool, doesn’t it?” John muses, gazing up at the orange-lit sky.

“Not r-really,” Paul says. He doesn’t miss Liverpool much. John throws him an amused glance.

“You not live there in the future, then?” he asks, but he’s teasing. He still doesn’t believe Paul.

Ringo’s words from earlier echo through Paul’s mind.

_If it’s that important to you that he believes it, don’t stop trying to convince him. _

“John,” Paul begins, and then stops. He’s tried everything, hasn’t he? He’s told John everything – _anything _– he can remember about the future. There’s nothing more he can say. Unless…unless he tells John something only Paul would know. Something only John knows right now, but future Paul knows too.

There is something…but John won’t like it. John might not even really know it himself, at this point. It’s a gamble – a risky fucking gamble, at that – but since Paul’s probably the first person to ever have time-travelled, he can kind of make up his own rules, right?

John’s not said anything, but he’s looking at Paul curiously, waiting for him to continue.

“John,” Paul starts again. “I know you don’t believe me.”

“Don’t really see why I should,” John says. Paul ignores him.

“I know you don’t believe me,” he presses on, “but I need you to. I’m alone here, John. No one else knows but you, and you don’t even believe me. I’ve lost- I’ve lost a lot, and I’m grieving that – them – and trying to cope with this all at the same time. I need you to believe me.”

“I want doesn’t get,” John says.

“If I tell you something that only I could know from the future, will you believe me?” Paul says.

“We already have a deal,” John says. “I’ll believe you when- when thingy gets murdered, and I Want to Hold Your Hand goes to number one.”

“I don’t think you will,” Paul says plainly.

“No, I probably won’t,” John says casually. Paul blinks at him pleadingly, and he sighs. “Alright,” he relents. “Tell me this other thing you’ve concocted, then.” Paul takes a deep breath.

“You’re bisexual,” he says.

John doesn’t say anything for a moment, and Paul’s heart is in his throat. He tries to swallow it back down, to no avail.

“Are you calling me a queer?” he asks eventually. He sounds strangled, and simultaneously calm. Paul’s not entirely sure what to make of it, but it scares him on an intuitive level.

“I’m calling you what you later tell me you are,” Paul says. “Bisexual. You like men _and _women. And for the record, John, I don’t care. I don’t think- y’know, back in these days, people are really unforgiving. And in the future, it’s not like that. Well, sometimes it is, but it’s not like _this_, mostly. It’s perfectly normal. They can even adopt kids, and get married, and stuff.”

“You think I’m a poof?” John says. It’s like he never even heard Paul speak.

“I think- John, I don’t know. I think you’re whatever you tell me you are,” Paul says.

“I’m telling you right fucking now,” John says, “that I am _not_ a fucking _queer_.” He spits the word with such vitriol that Paul recoils instinctively.

“Brian’s gay,” Paul says, as if that somehow expresses everything he wants to say right now.

“Doesn’t mean _I_ am,” John says.

“Never said you were,” Paul says. “Bisexual, I said. Men _and _women.”

“You think I’m queer,” John repeats.

“I don’t,” Paul says. “And I don’t care that you’re- or you will be – or – fuck, I don’t know. It doesn’t matter to me. It really, _really _doesn’t. I care about you just as much either way.”

John’s silent for a very, _very _long moment.

“Men…_and_ women?” is all he says slowly, when he speaks. Paul lets out a breath he hadn’t even realised he’d been holding.

“Men _and_ women,” he confirms. “Christ, John, as if anyone could ever doubt you like shagging birds.” John doesn’t smile.

“Why do I tell you that?” he asks. Paul falters.

“Don’t know,” he says. “Just comes up, I guess.”

He’s not lying – the conversation is hazy, but he’s pretty sure it had involved a lot of drugs. He remembers lying with his head on John’s stomach, and John’s fingers in his hair, and John murmuring that he likes shagging blokes _and_ birds, and Paul humming his agreement, a sudden image of himself pressed up against a wall by an oddly familiar man flashing through his mind. He’s always blamed it on the drugs, because Paul’s never felt anything for a bloke before, so it makes no sense that his mind would suddenly conjure such an image. He never even knew who the strangely familiar man was.

“Wouldn’t just fucking tell you that,” John says. “Must’ve been a reason.”

“I don’t know, John,” Paul says. “I’m not a mind reader.”

“Clearly fucking not,” John says. “You think I’m fucking queer. I’m fucking not, Paul. Just because I’m friends with Brian, Christ, does that make us all queer?”

“No, but-”

“Right then,” John says decisively, and Paul knows it’s the end of the conversation. “You go back to bed and stop talking absolute bollocks, and I’ll ring the hospital and let them know you need a room.”

“_John_,” Paul says beseechingly. “It’s not a bad thing. I- fuck. I’ve thought about…stuff with a man, before.” It’s not technically a lie – that quick fantasy _had _crossed his mind, and Paul _had_ sprung a semi from it. But John doesn’t need to know that it was because of the drugs.

“Don’t fucking _tell _me that,” John hisses. “You’ll go to bloody _jail_.”

Ah, _fuck_. Paul had forgotten, somehow, that it was still _illegal_, not just frowned upon.

“Well, I’m fucking telling you,” he hisses back, suddenly bold. “I’ve thought about it. I got hard off it. ‘S nothing bad.”

John stares at him for a moment, a look on his face that Paul has never seen before. It’s unnerving, but he holds John’s gaze.

“I’m going to bed,” John says shortly, turning on his heel without looking at Paul. “You should too. Early start tomorrow, y’know.”

But as the door slides shut behind John, Paul realises he’s still got John’s jacket over his shoulders.

That’s John-speak for _you’re forgiven_.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> why do i have an actual problem with stopping writing some of these scenes

Paul wakes up early the next morning, exhausted after a restless night spent with a pillow over his head to either drown out Ringo’s snores or suffocate himself. He blinks, sunlight streaming in through the flimsy curtains, and rolls over to look at Ringo.

“Hullo,” Ringo says.

“Hello,” Paul says. “You been up long?”

“No, just woke up,” Ringo says. “Sleep well?”

“‘Course I bloody didn’t, not with you snoring away,” Paul says, and Ringo has the decency to look sheepish.

“Well, when you and John sort yourselves out George can go back to dealing with it,” he says. Paul hums and flops onto his back, staring up at the ceiling as he lets the memory of his and John’s conversation last night flood back to him.

He immediately blanches, stomach dropping.

Fucking hell, he’d told John that he got hard thinking about a _man_? What in God’s name was going through his mind when he’d said that? It’s not even really _true_, is it? He had got hard thinking of a man, sort of, but not _really_, because it had been the drugs, hadn’t it?

“You alright?” Ringo asks curiously, now up and fastening the cuffs of his shirt.

“Mm,” Paul hums, not trusting himself to speak without throwing up. Ringo throws him a strange look.

“Right,” he says sarcastically, raising his eyebrows. He does, however, choose not to comment. “Well, I’m going down for breakfast. Coming?”

“Mm-mm,” Paul says, with a small shake of his head. His stomach is churning now; he doesn’t think he’ll be able to keep anything down.

“I’ll bring you up some toast,” Ringo says. “See you later.” The door clicks shut behind him, and Paul lets out a breath.

Fuck. _Fuck_. He doesn’t even know where to _begin_.

John’s going to think he’s into _men_. Fuck, John might even think Paul’s into _him_, which is absolutely the furthest thing from the truth. Paul doesn’t even know how he feels about John half of the time these days. Somehow, time and nostalgia had had a way of romanticising all of John’s edges, his barbs, the way he pushed all of Paul’s buttons in a manner nobody else ever could. _Oh, that was John_, Paul would say in 2020, and he’d smile wistfully, and he’d down another tumbler of whiskey. _He always knew how to rile me up_. But in 1963, it’s suddenly not as funny. It’s not nostalgic anymore, it’s real, and Paul’s still a human being with emotions, and John’s still got a knack for spotting buttons to press that Paul didn’t even know he had.

But that’s all distracting from the main point, which is that _fuck_, he’s told John some stuff that John might not be okay with. It could change their friendship irrevocably – no more sharing a bed, top-and-tailing, late nights in the studio with their faces so close together that Paul can’t even focus on him and John looks like he has one eye. It could make John pull away, and Paul can’t face that. Not again.

The first time it had happened, Paul hadn’t known what was going on, really. He saw John parading Yoko around, rubbing her in everyone’s face, but he’d known that it was really directed at him. _Spiteful_, he’d said to Linda bitterly. _He’s so fucking spiteful_. But he’d carried on coming into the studio every day, hoping in vain that that day would be different, she wouldn’t be there, things would be the way they always had been. Then one day, it had become clear to Paul that he was living a delusion, when John had sat him down with Yoko by his side and told him he wanted a divorce.

A fucking divorce. It had felt more like an annulment.

John had ripped himself from Paul’s life, and it had sent shockwaves ricocheting through every part of Paul’s existence. He couldn’t get out of bed, couldn’t stop drinking just to dull the pain and the thoughts and the crippling loneliness and sense of abandonment, and the fucking _guilt_ because Linda was there, Linda was always there, but she wasn’t _John_. Watching John flounce around New York, partying and laughing and making spiteful comment after spiteful comment in interviews while Paul churned out mediocre hit after mediocre hit, crying out for John’s attention in his music. _I can’t do it without you_. _Come back to me_.

The only thing that had kept Paul alive in those darkest of days was John’s music. It wasn’t as good as what they did together, and that was the only way that Paul knew that John needed him too. _Two jagged parts of a smooth whole_, he’d once said to Linda, and he’d watched the sad smile cross her face because she knew what he knew, what they all knew. Nobody could ever be to Paul what John was. Nobody had as much of Paul’s heart as John did.

Paul feels even more sick now than he had at the start of this thought process, because wandering into the post-Beatles territory of his memories always hits him just as hard as it had the first time. That same sickening, terrified feeling, watching John smirk and walk away. No, not this time. Paul’s not going to let that happen this time. He’s been given a second chance at this, a second go at his life, and he’s not going to spend it living out all of his past regrets a second time.

With that thought as his Dutch courage, Paul staggers out of bed, throwing on yesterday’s shirt and trousers haphazardly, and pulling on his shoes as he stumbles out of the door. He starts down the corridor, hoping a room number will spring out at him as he goes – he hadn’t been paying the slightest bit of attention when Brian was assigning room numbers yesterday – and hoping that John will still be in there, late getting up as usual, and not having chosen this one day to join the others for breakfast.

A door opens to Paul’s left as he’s walking down the corridor, doing up his shirt buttons as he goes, and John steps out. He starts in surprise when he sees Paul.

“Fancy seeing you here,” he says.

“Hello,” Paul says. John blinks at him.

“Well?” he prompts. Paul stares back.

“What?” he asks.

“Well, you were clearly coming to see me, so what is it?” John says.

“Can we go in?” Paul says, nodding at the door. He doesn’t really want the entire corridor to hear what he wants to tell John. Not that it’s anything bad, per se, it’s just…private.

“If you wish,” John says, turning the key in the lock and holding the door open for Paul to pass through. He lets the door shut behind him with a click, and rounds on Paul.

“Well, we’re in,” he says.

“So we are,” Paul says. John waits.

“John,” Paul says, after it becomes clear John’s not going to speak until Paul does. The morning sun is shining on John, lighting up his face, and it’s strangely distracting.

“That’s me,” John says, shaking Paul out of his brief exploration of the crevices starting to form on a young John’s face that’ll only get deeper and wider as the years pass.

“I’ve been thinking,” Paul begins.

“Don’t strain yourself,” John remarks. Paul elects to ignore him.

“I don’t want things between us to be like this,” Paul says. “Life’s too short.” John gives him a strange look, almost looking disappointed. Paul wonders for a brief moment whether John had been hoping Paul would bring up their conversation last night – but no, surely not, when John had made his position so clear.

“You’re twenty-one,” John says. He doesn’t say _what do you know about life being too short?_, but he doesn’t need to. The implication is there.

“I’m not,” Paul says. John rolls his eyes.

“Right, how could I forget? All those wrinkles and grey hair really give it away,” he says.

“John,” Paul says. “Can you take a conversation seriously for once in your bloody life, _please_?”

“Alright, alright,” John grumbles. “Things aren’t bad. Anymore,” he amends. “We’re fine.”

“We’re fine, but we’re not alright,” Paul says. “John. I- Christ, I _need _you, alright? I need you in order to function properly.” John’s quiet for a moment.

“You don’t need me,” he says eventually. “You need the idea of me.”

“What?”

“You need what you think I am,” John says. “Could be your best friend, could be your arch-enemy. You don’t need _me_, Paul. You’re Paul Mc-fucking-Cartney.” Paul’s absolutely baffled.

“What?” he asks again, after a beat.

“What I’m _trying _to say, is…” John trails off. “You just need me as a foil, Paul.”

“No,” Paul says. “I need _you_, John.” God, if there’s one thing he’s learnt over the years, it’s that Paul McCartney needs John Lennon like the rest of humanity need air to breathe.

“Why?” John asks. Paul looks at him.

“What d’you mean, why?” he says. John folds his arms.

“Why?” he repeats. The morning sun is lighting up his eyes, the stubborn set of his jaw and brow.

Well. Paul’s got an answer to that, but he can’t exactly share it. _Because I know what it’s like to live without you_ isn’t going to go down well.

“I just know,” Paul says. “I know that I need you. _You_.”

“You can’t know that,” John says, but there’s a hint of a pleased smile playing on the corner of his lips, and Paul feels a small surge of hope that things are going to be alright.

“I can,” Paul says, emboldened by the sudden hope rushing from his heart to his head. “And I do.”

“Is this some of your future shite again?” John says.

“Might be,” Paul says evasively. John huffs, but there’s a fond look in his eyes, and the sick feeling in Paul’s stomach finally gives way to relief because fuck, they’re okay now. John might not believe him yet, might not ever believe him, but at least they’re alright.

“You’re mental, you are,” John says, shaking his head. “C’mon, you’ve kept me long enough, I’m starving. Let’s go down.” He claps a hand on Paul’s shoulder, but it lingers there a moment too long to be bloke-to-bloke-like. It’s because they’re making up, Paul thinks. John’s just equally pleased things are better now.

“Alright,” Paul says, suddenly realising just how empty his stomach is. John grins at him, the fond look still in his eyes, and Paul’s heart swells with something he’s not sure he quite likes, but certainly doesn’t dislike either.

He shakes that thought out of his mind, and follows John out of the room, almost immediately bumping into a very indignant looking Ringo.

“I smuggled these out of breakfast for you,” he says, brandishing a stack of toast. “And I come back to our room to find you gone, frolicking with our John here!”

“Sorry,” Paul says, grinning, because he’s not sorry at all.

“Smuggled!” Ringo repeats, waving the buttery toast in Paul’s face. “My pockets are never going to be the same again, y’know.”

“You’re a good lad, Ringo,” Paul says, but he takes the toast from Ringo’s hands and bites into it. “Happy?” he mumbles around a mouthful of incredibly mediocre lukewarm toast.

“My pockets aren’t,” Ringo says, pointing at Paul. “I’m having your jacket for the show tonight, thank you very much.”

Paul makes a mental note not to put his hands in his pockets tonight.

\-------------------------------------

The day’s been fairly dull, travelling down from Newcastle to Hull and watching the dull grey sky blend into the dull grey landscape of the industrial north.

(“Who agreed to playing a bloody show in Hull?” John grumbles, and Paul has to silently agree.)

The show that evening goes well, Paul slipping up fewer times than in Newcastle, and this time John flashes him a grin every time he fumbles his notes or sings the wrong harmony. Paul likes the buzz it sends coursing through his veins, likes the adrenaline and heady feeling of dizzy confidence it gives him.

Ringo and George remark on it when they come offstage, sweaty and panting but buzzing with energy that needs some kind of a release, piling into the car and discarding jackets and shoes, much to Brian’s disgust. George thrusts a shoe under Brian’s nose, and they all fall about giggling at the face Brian pulls.

“You’re such children,” Brian says haughtily, but he can’t help but laugh too at the sight of the four of them. Paul misses this, misses laughing and joking and just being with his friends, his best friends. Things aren’t the same when everyone’s all grown up and have families and wives and business to attend to.

“And you’re such a good mother,” George says, grinning as he kicks his shoes into the middle of the cramped car. “‘Ere, hang on, is that us? Turn the radio up, will you?” The driver obliges, and the tinny sound of She Loves You echoes through the car. The four of them immediately join in, harmonising perfectly as they did only an hour ago in front of thousands of people. This time, their audience (Brian) doesn’t seem particularly impressed, which makes the four of them sing louder, Ringo slapping his knees in time to the beat.

“You need to work on those harmonies at the end, boys,” Brian says when they finish, loud and slightly off-key, and John scowls at him.

“You need to work on appreciating us for the _artistes_ that we are,” John says, with a flourish. It reminds Paul so much of a later John that his heart suddenly pulls in a strange, horrible manner.

“…assailant has been named as Jack Ruby,” the radio commentator says, voice still echoing loudly in the small car.

“Turn it back down,” Ringo shouts to the driver. “Nothing to hear now that we’re over.”

“Hang on,” Paul says, when the driver reaches for the volume knob. “Keep it on. I want to hear.” Jack Ruby. That name rings something of a bell. Was this some famous murder he’d forgotten about?

“Reports came in from America an hour ago that Lee Harvey Oswald, the man who shot Kennedy on Friday, died in hospital following the shooting,” the commentator says.

“Oh, _that_ was his name,” Paul says, thinking aloud, and four heads snap to look at him. “I mean, I forgot the shooter’s name. The guy who shot Kennedy.”

“Hang on,” Ringo says slowly. “You said Kennedy was going to die this year, didn’t you?”

Oh, Christ. Not again.

“What?” Brian says, keen eyes on Paul, who’s suddenly nervous. He feels like he’s playing his first show all over again, but this time his audience are his three best friends and manager. Somehow, that’s far more terrifying.

“Yeah, he did,” George says curiously. “When he came out of that hospital last month, on the way back to Liverpool, he said Kennedy would die this year.” Paul forces out a laugh.

“I don’t remember that,” he says. “Must’ve been a lucky guess.”

“Who just _happens _to guess accurately that a state leader is going to die?” George asks.

“Me, clearly,” Paul says.

“How did you know that?” Brian asks.

“I didn’t,” Paul says.

“You have a vision, or something?” George asks seriously.

“Yeah, Jesus came to me and told me he was going to take Kennedy this year, best make my preparations,” Paul says, trying for light and humorous. It falls flat.

“I don’t see how you’d know that,” Ringo says, shaking his head.

“C’mon, lads,” John says, speaking for the first time. “He was probably still off his head on whatever drugs they were pumping into him at the hospital on the way home. Remember how bad he looked, eh?”

“Oh, _thanks_,” Paul mutters, and John shoots him a warning look. _I’m saving your bloody arse_, it says, and Paul’s gripped by a sudden wave of both fear and gratefulness.

“S’pose…” George says, but he doesn’t sound convinced.

“He got scared of his own reflection,” John says. “You really think he knows what he was saying? Probably had some kind of dream, or something.”

“That’s a vision then, in’t it?” Ringo says.

“Could’ve been anyone he dreamt of dying, though. Just happened to be Kennedy he remembered,” John says. “Probably dreamt all sorts of weird stuff – remember how strange he was acting when he woke up, confused that it was 1963?”

“Right, of course, that makes sense,” Brian says, satisfied with John’s answer. Brian’s always satisfied when he doesn’t have to worry any more than he already does about the four of them, and Paul feels momentarily guilty for the amount of stress they must have put – be putting? – Brian under these few years. He resolves to never get on Brian’s nerves again, and then immediately amends the resolution to the more realistic trying his best not to get on Brian’s nerves too many times a day.

“Still, bit creepy,” George says, clearly not fully convinced, and Ringo nods in agreement.

“Oh, boys, I forgot, did we assign rooms?” Brian says suddenly, and the moment passes. Paul lets out a shaky breath and meets John’s eyes. John holds his gaze, an impenetrable look on his face, before tearing his eyes away and putting on his too-cheerful front as he butts into the conversation between Ringo, Brian and George. 

“I’ll room with Paul tonight,” he says loudly. “Deserves a good night’s sleep after having to room with Ringo last night.”

“Right charmer, you are,” Ringo grumbles, smacking John’s arm.

“That’s settled, then,” Brian says, handing a key to John and a key to Ringo. “And I want lights out by ten, boys.”

“Alright, _mother_,” George says, smirking at the displeased look on Brian’s face. Paul manages a weak smile, turning to look out of the window with a churning stomach and sweaty palms.

What’s John going to say now?

\-------------------------------------

John, it turns out, doesn’t want to say much at all.

They get into their room, slamming the door in Brian’s face as he’s reminding them to turn the lights off by ten, and John immediately throws himself down on a bed and starts flicking through a book he’s brought with him.

Paul sits down gingerly on his bed, staring at John as though willing him to speak, but John doesn’t even look at him.

“Are we going to talk about it?” Paul asks eventually.

“About what?” John says.

“Come off it,” Paul says. “You know what.” John sighs.

“Paul, we’re having this same conversation every single day,” he says, not looking up from his book. “I’m bored of it. We have a deal.”

“Part of the deal’s fulfilled now,” Paul presses. “You still don’t believe me?”

“No,” John says shortly, turning a page in his book. “‘Sides, I Want to Hold Your Hand doesn’t come out for another week.”

“You’re impossible,” Paul says in disbelief. “You doubt that I Want to Hold Your Hand is going to be number one more than you doubt that I can accurately predict that the guy who shot Kennedy – which, by the way, I also predicted – was going to get shot himself? You taking the piss?”

“No, Paul, what I _doubt_ is that you’re _seventy-eight _and from the _future_,” John snaps, closing his book with a thud.

“I don’t blame you,” Paul says, “but what other explanation do you have?”

“I don’t know,” John says tiredly. “I just don’t think you’re from the future.”

“Why not?” Paul asks.

“Because you can’t be,” John says.

“Even after everything I’ve told you?”

“_Especially _after everything you’ve told me.” Paul swallows. He knows what John’s talking about.

“Look, John-” he begins, but John cuts him off.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” he says curtly. “None of your predictions are going to change my mind. We have a deal.”

“Deal’s that you believe me if it happens,” Paul argues.

“If it _all _happens,” John corrects. Paul opens his mouth to say something indignant – _why the fuck is one thing not enough?_ – but then, it suddenly hits him. John’s waiting to see if I Want to Hold Your Hand is going to number one because he doesn’t want Paul to be right.

“You’d rather I were insane,” Paul says, realisation dawning on him. “You’d rather I were wrong about all of this, and just losing my fucking mind.”

“Yes, _Paul_, I’d rather you were going _fucking _insane, because then at least you’d be _my _fucking Paul!” John shouts suddenly, slamming his book down on the bed, startling Paul.

“Fucking hell, John,” Paul says quietly. “I’m still your Paul.”

“I don’t know who the _fuck _you are,” John spits.

“So you believe me?” Paul says.

“What fucking choice do I have?” John yells. “How the fuck else would you know all of this shit? You’re from the fucking future, you’ve got to be, and that means that _my Paul _is _missing _somewhere, on his own in some future where he’s _seventy-eight_, God knows where the fuck _I _am, probably scared out of his bloody _mind!_” He stares fiercely at Paul, eyes blazing, breathing heavily.

“I don’t know if we swapped,” Paul says.

“Where the fuck else would he have gone?” John asks, through gritted teeth. 

“I don’t know,” Paul admits, and John throws his hands up.

“See?” he says. “You don’t even fucking care about him, do you? That’s _you_ you’re talking about.”

“If he’s anywhere at all, he’ll be fine,” Paul says. “The future’s much nicer, y’know.”

“Oh, aye, he’ll be fine, will he?” John asks furiously. “You’re forgetting you’ve lived through all this before, aren’t you? None of this is fucking new to you, Paul. _All _of that will be new to him. All of it. He won’t have a fucking clue what to do.”

He’s right. Paul hadn’t thought about that. He hadn’t even thought about whether there might _be_another Paul, or where the other Paul might be until John had put the thought into his mind.

“Hang on,” he says. “Why are _you_ so upset about it? I’m _me_, y’know. If anyone’s allowed to dictate how people feel about this whole situation, it’s me.”

“What sort of bloody logic is that?” John asks. “Anyone’s allowed to care.”

“Yeah, but it’s _me_,” Paul says. “_My _life. And I know what the future is like. I think – if there even _is _another Paul – he’ll be fine. They’ve got- uh, all sorts of stuff that he’d like. He’d- I’d probably start participating in Paul McCartney lookalike contests for a lark.”

“This is all a big fucking joke to you, isn’t it?” John says bitterly.

“No, John, it fucking isn’t,” Paul says. “I fell asleep aged seventy-eight in 2020, and I woke up back in 1963. I don’t remember _anything_ about what life was like back then. I don’t know what it’s like to live without certain things anymore, don’t remember where I was living at this point in my life, who I was friends with, what songs we’d written, I don’t fucking know any of that. I’m just as out of my depth as any Paul in the future would be, with the added pressure that I’ve got to try and make sure things go the same way they did last time or else the fucking world might blow up, or something.”

John’s silent for a moment.

“You’d better be right about the future,” he says eventually. Paul rolls his eyes.

“Christ, John, it won’t kill you to say the words _I’m sorry _for once, y’know,” he says.

“I’m not sorry,” John says stubbornly. “I stand by everything I said.”

“You’re a right git,” Paul says, exasperated, but there’s no heat behind the words.

“Takes one to know one,” John says.

“Prat,” Paul says, throwing a pillow at him. John dodges it expertly.

“So,” he says. “What have we got in the future that you’re missing so badly now, eh?” Paul swallows down the bitter taste in his mouth at John’s easy use of the word _we_ and lets the giddy feeling of _John believes me, John believes me, John believes me!_ wash over him.

“Phones that you can take anywhere with you,” he says. “They’re computers, too.” John laughs.

“Stop pulling my leg,” he says.

“I’m not,” Paul says, grinning. “They’re little things, about yay big-” he indicates with his hands “-and they’re computers. They have this amazing thing called the internet on them, which…God, I don’t even know how to explain the internet to you, but it’s incredible. And you can just phone people, walking around anywhere you fancy, and text them.”

“Text?” John asks.

“Texting…it’s like…sending letters, but in real time,” Paul says. “It’s like having a phone conversation, but typed. You’re talking to the person live.”

“How does that work?” John asks curiously.

“Satellites, I think,” Paul says.

“And this- inter…interwhatsit?”

“Internet,” Paul supplies. “Christ, John, I don’t even know how to explain it to you.”

“Try,” John says.

“It’s like…it’s like the biggest encyclopaedia, biggest library of every tidbit of human knowledge, accessible on any computer – including your phone, in the future. All of human knowledge right in the palm of your hand,” Paul says.

“So, like what?” John says. “Can you just say to it, _who is John Lennon?, _and it’ll tell you?”

“Well, yes,” Paul says. “It’s a bit more complicated than that. If I went to Google – that’s a search engine – which, uh, is like asking someone who has every bit of human knowledge stored inside them – and typed in _who is John Lennon_, I’d get pages and pages of results of your biography, your music, videos and pictures of you, articles about you, opinion pieces…basically everything that’s ever been said or created about you would be there.”

“Bloody hell, and that’s all accessible on your portable phone-computer?” John asks. “No wonder you miss that.”

“Phones also have GPS navigation – that’s the use of satellites to find your way around – which is _so _much easier than reading maps,” Paul says. “I missed that a _lot_ in London.” 

“What else is there?” John says.

“Better food,” Paul says.

“What else?”

“Phones have cameras on them too, y’know,” Paul says, suddenly remembering. “And you listen to music on them, with headphones.”

“You can listen to music anywhere you go?” John asks. “Hang on, isn’t it a bit cumbersome taking headphones with you everywhere?”

“No, they’re a lot smaller than the studio ones,” Paul says. “They go in your ears, mostly.”

“That’s an earphone, then,” John says.

“I just call ‘em all headphones,” Paul says. “I’m old, I’m allowed.” John grins at him.

“You’re older than me now,” he says, sounding incredibly pleased. “_I’ll _be the one making jokes about carting you off to a retirement home. Hang on, are you in a retirement home?” Paul throws another pillow at him in indignation.

“Of course I’m not!” he says. “I’m only seventy-eight!”

“That’s pretty old,” John says. “God, I’m eighty then, aren’t I? Am _I _in a retirement home?” Paul swallows.

“None of us are,” he says, which is technically true. “But I don’t think I should tell you about your future, or our future. I think that- that might complicate things. But things that you have no control over, world events, I think I can tell you that.”

“Go on then,” John says. “Do we have another war?” Paul thinks of John’s Vietnam War activism.

“Right, that’s something I can’t actually tell you,” he says.

“Why, are we _in _the war?” John asks.

“No, but- hang on, I’m not going to be tricked into giving you more information,” Paul says.

“Alright,” John huffs. “Well, I don’t know what questions to ask, ‘cause I’m not from the future, am I?”

“Well, I don’t have my phone to look up ‘major events of the twentieth century’, so I can’t help you much either,” Paul says.

“You’re telling me you don’t remember?” John says in disbelief.

“I remember, but not when I’m put on the spot like this,” Paul says. “Oh, I know. We land on the moon in 1969.” John gapes at him.

“We go to the _moon?_” he says, sounding strangled.

“Yeah,” Paul says. “It’s _huge_. Everyone watches it all over the world.”

“Why the fuck do we go to the _moon_?” John asks.

“Scientific exploration, I dunno,” Paul says. “Think it’s to do with the USSR and US, or something.”

“What’ve we got to do with that?” John asks.

“Eh?” Paul asks.

“We’ve got nothing to do with that,” John says. “Why do they send us to the moon?” Paul bursts out laughing.

“Christ, John, I meant _humanity_,” he says. “They don’t send the bloody _Beatles_ to the moon.” John looks like he’s caught somewhere between shocked and outraged.

“Well, fucking hell, you’ve just told me we have portable phones that double as computers and a library of infinite knowledge to browse and you think the idea of us going to the _moon _is far-fetched?” he says indignantly.

“You can’t even drive a _car_, John,” Paul says. “They’re not going to let you commandeer a bloody _rocket_.” John throws one of the pillows Paul had chucked at him back at Paul with perfect aim, hitting him square in the face.

“Are you this much of a git in the future?” he asks.

“Given that I’m from the future, yes,” Paul says.

“I’m rooming with George again tomorrow,” John threatens, but he doesn’t mean it.

“Feel free,” Paul says. “Don’t know how I’ll sleep without Ringo’s snores anyway.” John snorts.

“Speaking of sleep,” he says, sitting up on the bed and kicking his suitcase open. Paul nods, turning to his own suitcase and taking out his pyjamas. It’s late, well after midnight, and they have to be up early tomorrow. And now that John finally _believes_ him, Paul thinks he can sleep easy for the first time since arriving back in the past.

They make quick business of getting changed, and John flips off the light switch on the bed after waiting for Paul to shuffle in between the sheets. There’s a few minutes of silence as they both get comfortable, and Paul’s eyelids are starting to droop when John speaks.

“Christ,” John says faintly into the darkness, as if it’s only just hit him. “You’re from the future."

“Yeah,” Paul whispers.

Neither of them say anything else, but they both lie there, awake, knowing that the other is too but not knowing what to say.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank u to my wonderful housemate/beta A for reading through this for me and catching every tiny error i made and making such insightful suggestions as to how improve the fic this is the first fic of mine she's beta'd in 5 years (which is actually how we met) dream team back together again x

When Paul wakes up the next morning, John’s already up, lying in bed reading the book he’d flung around in their conversation yesterday. He’s drawn open the curtains a little, just enough for the light to filter in on his side of the room, and it’s casting shadows on his angular face, highlighting his nose and his eyelashes. His eyes look almost amber in the light, and Paul watches them flit from left to right as John reads. He’s always loved watching John just _ be_, watching the genius in him take a step back and let the man take the reins. John with his guard down in his vulnerable, candid moments is strangely beautiful, Paul thinks. 

As if John knows he’s being thought about, he turns and catches Paul’s eye. Paul suddenly feels exposed, like a child being caught with his hand in the biscuit tin.

“Morning,” Paul says, feeling himself flush and coughing into his hand to give him somewhere to look other than John. 

“Morning,” John replies. “Fancy breakfast?” Paul nods as best he can with his head still on the pillow. 

“‘M starving,” he says. John snaps his book shut, and Paul feels a little tug of disappointment, as though some part of him had hoped to simply continue watching John exist for a while. 

“Ringo’n George went down already,” John says. 

“Time’s it?” 

“Nine-thirty,” John says. Paul blinks at him. 

“Fuck are you doing up at nine-thirty, eh?” he says. 

“Day off, mate,” John says, with a grin. 

“A day off? In fucking Hull?” Paul’s outraged. John shrugs. 

“I’ll take what I can get,” he says. “Not all of us are used to swanning around our retirement homes with nothing to do.” He’s going for humour, but sounds like he’s trying to convince himself of something. Paul scowls at him. 

“I told you, I’m not in a retirement home,” he says. 

“Whatever you say,” John says. “C’mon, get up, I’m starving.” 

“Could’ve just gone down,” Paul says, but he gets out of the warm bed and pulls his suit from the chair he’d left it on last night. John shrugs, but he doesn’t meet Paul’s eyes, and Paul’s stomach flips at the idea that John’s been waiting for him to wake up to go down for breakfast. It’s being on good terms with John again, he thinks, that’s what’s causing that small ember-like warmth in the pit of his stomach. 

“Just bloody get dressed,” John says, and Paul rolls his eyes, making his way over to the en suite bathroom. 

He’s still not used to his young face. He still expects wrinkles, and is surprised every time he reaches up to touch his face and finds soft, smooth, young skin. Paul watches himself in the mirror as he brushes his teeth, sees his own wide, round eyes blink back at him, and feels strangely unsettled. It’s him, but he feels like it’s someone else. There’s a complete disconnect between his mind and his body. 

He shakes the thoughts away, spitting out the toothpaste, and makes quick work of getting dressed because the bathroom’s so fucking cold that he thinks he might get frostbite if he spends more than two seconds with any skin exposed. 

“Alright,” he says, pulling on his suit jacket as he clatters out of the bathroom. John’s eyes rake over him for a second before settling on his face, and it makes Paul feel oddly exposed. 

“Alright,” John agrees, putting his book down and swinging his legs over the side of the bed. “Give us our shoes, would you?” 

“What am I, your slave?” Paul says, kicking John’s shoes over to him. 

“Got to keep you around for something, don’t I?” John says, pulling his shoes on and standing up. “C’mon, George’n Ringo are waiting.” 

“No they’re bloody not,” Paul says, following John out of the door. As if George and Ringo would sit at a table full of food and wait for anyone. 

The breakfast room is small, chintzy affair, and they spot Ringo and George immediately, sat at a table with Brian and a plate heaped full with croissants and bacon. Paul pulls a face at the smell, and John catches it and rolls his eyes. 

“Morning,” Brian says pleasantly when they scrape back the two empty chairs and sit down. “Sleep well?” 

“Aye,” John says, reaching for a croissant and butter. He passes it to Paul wordlessly, then reaches back for another. “Slept better knowing we have today off.” 

“What’re you doing today?” Ringo asks, eyes flitting between John and Paul. For some reason, the fact that no one even questions whether John and Paul would spend their day off separately makes Paul feel slightly heady. 

“Don’t know yet,” Paul says, with a shrug, buttering his croissant. 

“What the fuck is there to do in Hull, anyway?” John mutters, sticking two rashers of bacon in his croissant. Paul’s pleased to find he’s not the only one who throws John a disgusted look. 

“You’re a pig,” George tells John matter-of-factly, nodding at his croissant. John raises the bacon croissant to his mouth and looks at George.

“Oink,” he says solemnly, before taking a huge bite. George shakes his head and reaches for another croissant. 

“There’s some museums,” Brian puts in. “They’ve got some beautiful old buildings.” 

“Christ, Brian, I’m twenty-three, not ninety-three,” John says. “Come to think of it, maybe Paul’ll go with you,” he adds, shooting a grin in Paul’s direction. Paul scowls at him as best he can through the bite of croissant he’s just taken. 

“I’m not going,” Brian says. “Some of us have work to do, y’know.” 

“Oh, aye?” George says. “And whose work d’you think it is that pays your bills, eh?” 

“Four lads who wouldn’t get any music done if it weren’t for their brilliant manager,” Brian says, wiping his hands on his napkin. 

“He has a point, y’know,” Ringo says, jabbing a fork in Brian’s direction, but looking at George. 

“Paul could organise us,” George says. 

“You really want _ Paul _ as a manager?” Ringo says. 

“Fair point,” George concedes. 

“Hey,” Paul says, affronted. “I’d make a good manager.” 

“You’d be a bloody nightmare,” Ringo says, and both John and George nod in agreement. Traitors. 

“I’m going back upstairs,” Brian says delicately, pushing his chair back. “I’ve got some phone calls to make.” 

“While you still have a job,” George says. 

“Aye, watch out for Paul,” Ringo shouts at Brian’s retreating figure. 

“Prick,” Paul says, helping himself to another croissant. 

“You thought of anything to do today, then?” John says to Ringo and George around a mouthful of bacon croissant. 

“Thought we could walk down to the Humber,” Ringo says. Paul shrugs. 

“Sounds alright to me,” he says, shooting a glance at John. John returns his shrug. 

“Alright,” he says, swallowing about a third of his croissant in one go. “Down to the Humber, lads.” 

\---------------

Mal tells them there is absolutely no way they can walk to the Humber, but they can probably walk along it a little out of town. The four of them agree that they can live with that, and so get in a car and drive for forty minutes, watching the dull grey landscape give way to crisp green fields. 

The driver drops them off in a deserted, countryside location, and they all plead with Mal to give them just _one hour_ of time on their own, come on, no one’s around, _please Mal – and frankly if we manage to get murdered by teenage girls on the bank of the Humber we probably deserve it- oh, thanks John, really helping our case here_. Mal, probably just to stop their wheedling, agrees to an hour on their own, and they gleefully skip off down an overgrown country lane leading to the river before he can change his mind. 

“Bit bland, in’t it?” Ringo says, peering around when they get to the end of the lane and see the vast expanse of flat sand. 

“Good ol’ Blighty, eh?” George says, kicking the sand.

“Think the Mersey might even be better than this,” Ringo remarks. 

“You just think that ‘cause it’s home,” John says. “Sentimental git, you are.” 

“Mersey’s never served us wrong, has it?” Ringo says indignantly. 

“Aye, but d’you want to be stuck in Liverpool the rest of your life?” John says. Ringo shrugs. 

“Wouldn’t mind it,” he says. 

“I can’t wait to leave,” John says. “Go out and see the world, y’know. Maybe even move out of England.” 

“With Cyn and Julian?” George asks. John stills for a second, almost imperceptible, and then shrugs. 

“She can do what she likes,” he says. “Fuck if I care.” 

“That’s your _ wife _, John,” Ringo says, a note of disapproval in his voice. 

“Aye, _ my _ wife, Ringo, so stick your nose somewhere else,” John snaps. 

“Alright, John, no need to bite his head off,” Paul says. “Let’s walk, eh?” 

“Where the bloody fuck’s the river, anyway?” John grumbles. 

“Over there, somewhere,” George says, nodding ahead of them. If Paul squints, he can see a faint glimmer of what might be water in the distance. “Tide’s out, I guess.” 

“C’mon, we’ve only got an hour,” Paul says, setting off in the direction of the water. “Let’s not waste it bickering.” 

“Bickering’s never a waste of time,” John says, but he follows Paul, as do George and Ringo. 

“Life’s too short,” Paul says, and John throws him a look. 

“Why couldn’t we have had our day off tomorrow in Cambridge, eh?” George mutters. “Bet that’s a sight prettier than here.” 

“Oh, I don’t know, I quite like it,” John says. “There’s beauty in blandness, y’know.” 

“Very poetic,” George remarks drily. 

“That’s our John,” Ringo says. 

They lapse into silence as they walk for a moment, and Paul squints out into the cold, November sunshine, watching the seagulls as they soar high above the flat banks and water of the Humber. It really is bland, he thinks – nothing to see for miles and miles but water and sand, not even the distant shape of a person. They’re truly alone, for the first time in months. Somehow, it feels incredibly freeing. 

“No one’s around,” Paul says, breaking the silence. 

“Aye, why d’you think that is, eh?” George says. “No one else is mad enough to come down here.” 

“Come off it, it’s alright,” Ringo says. “Nice to be alone, actually.” 

“For once,” John says. 

“For once,” George and Paul agree simultaneously. 

“Never thought it’d be like this, y’know,” Ringo says. 

“Don’t think any of us could have predicted it,” George says. Out of the corner of his eye, Paul sees John’s eyes dart to him briefly, and then return to George. 

“It’s mad, in’t it?” Ringo says. 

“Mad,” Paul agrees. 

“Reckon things’ll ever go back to normal?” Ringo asks.

“Don’t think so,” John says, and his eyes flit to Paul again for a moment. “How can it, now?” Ringo shrugs. 

“I know it’s what we wanted, but…” he trails off, but all of them are in silent agreement at what he leaves unsaid, Paul perhaps more than anyone else. He knows that the madness is just beginning, knows the price they’ll all have to pay – some, he thinks with a twist of his stomach, more than others. 

“At least we have each other,” Paul says. Things were always alright when they had each other. Things only started to fall apart when they did. 

“Yeah,” George says, and Paul knows that he means _ I don’t think we could do it without each other_. Maybe this time around, that’ll hold true. 

“Bloody hell, you sure there’s even a river here?” John asks after a moment of silence. “We’ve been walking ages, Mal’ll kill us.” George looks at his watch. 

“It’s only been fifteen minutes,” he says. “Race you to the water?” 

“Nah, don’t fancy coughing up a lung at this stage in my career,” John says. 

“I’ll race you,” Ringo says, and he sprints off without another word, making George swear loudly at him and set off in his wake. John and Paul watch them chase the horizon, ambling in comfortable silence for a while. Paul tilts his head into the ever-stronger breeze, letting the chill tighten his skin and remind him that he’s there, with John, in 1963. 

“I’ve got so many questions I want to ask you,” John says. “I don’t even know where to begin.” 

“I told you what’s off-limits,” Paul says, letting his eyes flutter shut for a brief moment as the breeze steals over him. “Nothing about you, or us.” 

“Right, ‘cause you’re a boring fucking git,” John says, but there’s no heat behind the words. 

“Rules of time travel,” Paul says. “Can’t have you messing things up.” 

“And what are you going to do, eh?” John says. “You being here is messing things up already. Bet we didn’t postpone the tour in your 1963.” 

“No,” Paul admits. “Didn’t fucking time travel that time, though, did I?” 

“All those shows we missed,” John says mock-wistfully, as though Paul hadn’t even spoken.

“I didn’t rent that flat in London last time, either,” Paul says. John scoffs. 

“You come here, telling me you can’t tell me anything lest it change the future, and you’re changing the past left right and centre!” he says. 

“Come on, renting a flat’s not going to change anything,” Paul says. 

“Might do,” John says. “You don’t know with these things, do you?” 

“Well, given that no one left me a handy guide to time travel, I’m kind of playing it by ear, John,” Paul says. John stops dead in his tracks.

“Christ, Paul,” he says, looking suddenly terrified. 

“What?” Paul says, suddenly equally afraid, but unsure why. 

“The music,” John says. “Fucking hell, that’s why you didn’t know any of the songs off the album. Ah, shit. How are we- do we just write the same songs again?” Paul sighs. 

“I don’t know,” he confesses. “I mean, of course, I remember the big ones, the hits, but I don’t think I could tell you every track on every album.” 

“Do you still write?” John asks. 

“Eh?” 

“In 2020. Do you still write?” Paul smiles, but it falters. 

“I try,” he says. “Still release music, if that’s what you mean.”

“That’s what I mean,” John says, but when Paul looks at him his brows are drawn and he looks quizzical. “Do we just write the same songs, then?” Paul bites his lip. This is dangerous territory; he can’t tell John _ yes, because otherwise pop music will be irrevocably changed_, but he can’t tell him no either. 

“Yeah,” he settles on eventually, “because they’re bloody good songs.” John grins at that. 

“Bet I write most of them,” he says. 

“Cheeky git,” Paul says. “I’m the one who knows them all already, so I’ll get there first.” 

“That’s plagiarism,” John says. 

“Not if you don’t know which ones I nicked off you it isn’t,” Paul says, dodging the swat John aims at him. 

“I’ll know,” John says, pointing at him. “You write sappy love songs, so when I see a song with substance I’ll know it’s mine.” 

“I don’t always write sappy love songs,” Paul says. 

“Yes you do,” John says. “The great Paul McCartney, perpetually in love.” Paul can’t hide his lips twitching in a tiny grimace at that, and John catches it. “What, aren’t you married by the time you’re seventy-eight?”

“John,” Paul says. “I can’t tell you about me.” 

“You’re definitely married,” John says carelessly. “Married, with seventeen kids, and you live on a farm and write songs about being in love with your wife and your fucking cows.” 

“John,” Paul says lowly. His kids are off-fucking-limits. The only way he’s seeing every day through is by telling himself they’ll just think he died, and they’ll mourn him and miss him but they’ll get on. He can’t keep re-opening the wound, picking at the child- and grandchild-shaped scab on his heart. 

“Oh,” John says after a moment. “I wasn’t- I didn’t think.” That’s as good an apology as Paul’s going to get. 

“When do you ever, eh?” Paul says, trying for a smile to lighten the mood. John smiles back, but it’s weak. 

“You must miss everyone in your life,” John says. 

“Like nothing else,” Paul says, and he hears the fervour in his voice. He clears his throat, and adds: “There are some perks of being back here, though.” 

“Oh, aye?” John says, scuffing his toes into the sand. 

“Yeah,” Paul says, and leaves it at that. 

“I’ve been thinking,” John says, after a moment of silence. “I- I think we should try swapping you and my- the other Paul back.” Paul winces. Every time John says he’s not _ John’s _ Paul it cuts a little deeper than the last time. 

“How d’you plan to do that?” Paul says. “Got a time machine?”

“Well, maybe if we recreate the scenario?” John says. “What were you doing?” 

“Sleeping,” Paul says. 

“Before that,” John says. 

“Drinking.” John brightens, and it makes Paul dull a little further, watching John’s mind calculating and his bright, excited eyes and thinking of the reason for the whiskey. 

“Alright, so was the other Paul,” John says. “That’s a start. Maybe you just need to be doing the same thing at the same time again.” 

“John, we don’t even know if there _ is _another Paul,” Paul says. 

“There has to be,” John says. “Who else would be in 2020?” Paul shrugs. 

“Maybe I’m just…gone,” he says, sounding a lot braver than he feels. 

“But on the off chance you’re not,” John persists. “Don’t you want to go back?” The question catches Paul off guard.

Of course, Paul misses his children, his grandchildren, his _ wife_, with a searing pain that he’s only felt a few times before in his life. Of course he misses them, and would give up the world to see them again, be with them one last time, hold their hands and press kisses to their foreheads. 

But would he give up John? No…_ could _ he give up John? 

Paul doesn’t know the answer to that. And, if he’s really, truly honest with himself, he doesn’t know whether giving up the prospect of another twenty-odd years with John is worth another five or so years with his family, who are dispersed all over the world and grown-up now anyway, living their own lives without Paul. 

“I don’t know,” he admits eventually, and John’s face turns to a look of surprise. 

“You were banging on about how great the future was last night,” he says. “Why wouldn’t you want to go back?” Because you’re not there, Paul thinks bitterly. 

“I can’t tell you,” he says heavily. 

“So you’d stay here?” John asks. The implication is clear.

“I know you don’t want me,” Paul says dully, answering his unasked question. 

“It’s not that,” John says. 

“Well, what is it, then?” Paul asks. 

“Well…you’re not _ Paul _,” John says. 

“I _ am _ Paul,” Paul says. “We’ve been over this.” 

“You’re not,” John says. “You’re calmer. You don’t eat meat, or smoke, and you’re more open with me.” 

“Those things don’t make me Paul,” Paul says. “I still make people record songs through the night until I’m happy with them. My temper still flares up when people push my buttons. I still fight with you like with no one else. I’m still a bit of a square, and a bit of a hippie. I still laugh when you put on your BBC presenter voice. I still say y’know too often. Just because I’m calmer after eight decades doesn’t mean I’m not me.”

“And the fact that you’re seventy-eight? Am I supposed to just ignore that?” John asks. 

“Well, fuck, John, I can’t do anything about how many times I’ve been around the bloody sun,” Paul says, throwing his hands in the air. “Being seventy-eight doesn’t change who I am, though, does it? Fundamentally, I mean. You’re no different at thirty-three than you are now at twenty-three, just a bit-” he cuts himself off. “Well. You’re always fundamentally the same person, aren’t you? You were John at thirteen, you’re John at twenty-three, you’ll be John at thirty-three.” 

John says nothing for a long moment, and by the time he speaks again, they’re almost at the water. Ringo and George have taken off their socks and shoes and are ankle-deep in the freezing river, laughter stolen by the wind as it whips by. 

“Alright,” John says eventually. 

“Alright?” Paul asks. 

“Alright,” John repeats. “You’re Paul. And if you want to stay here…” he trails off. 

“Thank you,” Paul says, and he means it, in the case of John believing him. He bites back a snarky comment about John deigning to let him stay, because he knows in himself if John didn’t want him, he wouldn’t have had anything to stay for. 

“And, for the record,” John says, as they get close enough to Ringo and George to hear their peals of laughter and shrieks of indignance as they splash each other with icy water. “I like that you’re more open with me now.” 

He takes off without waiting for Paul to figure out a response, jogging over to Ringo and George and pulling his own shoes and socks off to join them, leaving Paul reeling on the flat, sandy banks of the Humber. For some reason, that sentence felt like a hint that Paul should have understood, but somehow didn’t quite get a grip on before it slipped through his fingers. 

More open with John, he thinks, watching his three bandmates laughing and shrieking and splashing around in the cold, November river water. He gazes at John throwing his head back in a laugh when Ringo steps into a deeper part of the river than he’d anticipated and gets soaked up to his knees, watches the way his jaw catches the light and casts shadows on his throat. His eyes follow John as he chases George around the shallow bank of the river, splashing his feet purposefully and getting himself more wet than George in the process, eyes glimmering with warm joy, lips parted, cheeks flushed. 

_ Why not start with being more open with yourself? _the little voice in his head asks. 

Paul, letting his eyes close and seeing the frozen figure of John etched in his eyelids, doesn’t quite know what that’s supposed to mean.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi! i'm sorry i haven't updated in so long life has been pretty relentless for the past few months but i'm hoping to be uploading a little more regularly now :) i hope you're all doing well and had a great christmas/new years!

Paul had forgotten how relentless their touring schedule had been back then, once again making him thankful for his now twenty-one year old body. They get absolutely no rest for eight days until they’ve played Portsmouth, after which they get four sweet days off in Liverpool. As they’re jostling around the car to take them back up north, bickering amongst themselves about who has to sit in the middle, Brian pulls Paul aside.

“Oh, Christ, Brian, can’t it wait?” Paul says, not looking away from the car door, which is currently being held shut by Ringo, with John trying to pry it open. “George’ll nick my spot, and I’m not spending half a day sandwiched between John and Ringo.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Brian says, and Paul tears his eyes away from where John’s just got a sharp elbow into Ringo’s side, making him recoil and let go of the car handle. Brian looks incredibly grave, mouth downturned, crease in between his eyebrows. Paul’s stomach flips, and he suddenly feels very dizzy.

How the _fuck_ does Brian know? Surely John wouldn’t have told Brian…or would he? No, Paul decides, he wouldn’t, because John doesn’t tell anyone anything, especially where Paul’s concerned. So how the fuck does Brian know? Maybe John got drunk one night, Paul thinks – he’s got a much looser tongue after a few pints. Or maybe Brian just worked it out for himself, after the whole Kennedy debacle? Brian didn’t seem that concerned, though, seemed happy with John’s explanation-

“Well?” Brian prompts, startling Paul back to reality. Paul swallows nervously.

“I…I didn’t know how,” he says. “I thought you wouldn’t believe me.” It’s technically the truth. _I thought I could possibly ruin the entire universe and course of the future by telling people_ he leaves unsaid.

“Of course I’d believe you,” Brian says. “I mean, the way you’ve been acting lately, I thought something must have happened. I just wish I’d heard it from you.”

“I know,” Paul says, feeling like a child getting told off by his teacher. He can’t look Brian in the eye. “I’m sorry.” Brian sighs, and puts a comforting hand on Paul’s arm.

“It’s alright,” he says. “Are you coping?”

“I mean…as well as I can,” Paul says. How the fuck are people supposed to cope with time travel?

“We’ve all been there,” Brian says. “Let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

Hang on.

“What?” Paul says. Brian throws him a strange look.

“I said, we’ve all been there,” he repeats. “And to let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.” Paul blinks at him.

“Wait,” he says, “what are we talking about?”

“Jane,” Brian says.

“Oh,” Paul says, and then after a beat, “hang on, what?”

“You know, the fact she’s seeing someone else?” Brian says, as if stating the obvious.

“Oh,” Paul says. 

“What did you think I was talking about?” Brian asks, and now he sounds suspicious.

“That,” Paul says, but one look at Brian tells Paul he’s not buying it. 

“I don’t buy that,” Brian says. “What have you done?”

“Nothing!” Paul says, too quickly. “I’ve done nothing.”

“Paul,” Brian says warningly. “My job would be made a lot easier if you told me the messes you’ve made that I have to clean up.”

“I haven’t done anything!” Paul says indignantly, because technically he hasn’t. It happened to him; he didn’t _choose _it.

“I see,” Brian says knowledgeably. “This is what you and John were fighting about.”

“No, it’s not,” Paul bluffs. 

“So there _is_ something,” Brian says. Fucking hell.

“You’ve spent too much time around John for your own good,” Paul tells him. Brian smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. He looks…sad.

“Alright,” Brian says, with a long-suffering sigh. “Lie to me if you want, Paul. But I’m on your side. I’m not here to make your life difficult. When you want to talk about it, come and find me.” Paul opens his mouth to respond, but Brian just shakes his head and walks past him to the car.

Well, Paul thinks grimly as he gets into the car. At least Jane’s one problem ticked off his list.

(He feels a little guilty about it, before John shoots him a grin, making Paul’s stomach swoop in an odd way that feels almost like excitement. Then, without even realising, Paul doesn’t think about her for the rest of the journey.)

\---------------

Being at home is a lot more annoying than he remembers it being.

For starters, the fans know where he lives now, so he can’t leave his house without being accosted. Mal’s not there to protect him in Liverpool, so Paul takes to spending every day cooped up alone indoors. He cooks dinner for his dad and brother when they get home, giving vague half-truth answers when they ask where on Earth he learnt to cook so well so quickly, and why none of the meals contain meat. Neither of them have ever been to France, so how are they to know he didn’t spend three days in a Parisian kitchen and that the French do actually eat meat?

One thing he enjoys, though, is being able to play alone.

Here, in the comfort of his own room and the knowledge that no one can hear him, he can belt out some Radiohead, young voice able to hit the notes he never could before, and try and get the words to Kanye West right. It’s freeing, being able to engage with the future in a direct way, remind himself that that life was – is? – real, that he’s not just dreamt it all up. Somehow, every day he wakes up in 1963, the future (past?) slips out of his grasp a little more, and Paul’s not sure how long it’ll be before 1963 becomes his reality for the second time.

When John calls on the third day, asking to come over, Paul jumps at the opportunity. He’s bored out of his _mind_ by then, wondering how he ever manged to live without the internet. Part of him thinks John’s probably just asking to get away from Cynthia and Julian, but Paul chooses to push that thought away and focus on tuning his guitar for when John arrives.

“Never seen this house so bloody clean,” John remarks, barging through the door a few hours later. “Proper housewife, you are.” Paul scowls, shutting the door behind him before any fans can make it up the front path.

“What, because I don’t like to live in squalor?” Paul says, following him through to the living room.

“Well, you don’t mind it on tour, do you?” John says knowingly. “I think you’re _bored_.”

“Piss off,” Paul says. “Got a song out of it.”

“Oh yeah?” John asks, throwing himself down on the sofa and nodding to Paul’s guitar, sat in the corner. “Let’s hear it, then.”

Paul sits opposite him, cross-legged on the floor, and strums out the chords to Things We Said Today, singing a rough melody with what words he can remember. Last time, he wrote this on a yacht with Jane, but somehow it feels better this time having ‘written’ it in his bedroom on his own and playing it to John first.

“I think the F to B flat is a good change, right?” Paul says. He’s always liked that sound.

“Aye, it works well,” John says. “Is it supposed to be an acoustic song?”

“Eh?” Paul asks.

“Y’know,” John says. “Did we do it acoustic last time?”

“Uh…no,” Paul says.

“Can I make a suggestion, then?” John asks. Paul knows what it’s going to be.

(_Add a piano_, John had said.

_I don’t want to add a piano,_ Paul had said petulantly, crossing his arms. _Doesn’t work for this_.

_Trust me_, John had said.

So, of course, Paul had added a piano.)

It must show on his face, because John sits back, looking like Paul’s just said something unsavoury.

“You already know what I’m going to suggest,” he says.

“Well…yes,” Paul admits. No point in lying – John can always tell. “You think there should be a piano.”

“I do,” John says tightly.

“What?” Paul prompts.

“I don’t like this,” John says. “You already know everything I’m going to say, every suggestion I’m going to make. This isn’t songwriting. This is…I don’t know, but I don’t like it.” Paul sighs.

“Well, what am I supposed to do?” he asks, “lie?”

“You’ve already written all these songs,” John says.

“Not the ones you wrote,” Paul points out.

“Aye, but you know them before I’m going to write them,” John says. “D’you not see how that’s…fucked up?”

“What d’you suggest then, eh?” Paul says. “We’ve got to get the albums the way they were before.”

“Do we?” John says. “What happens if we don’t?”

“I don’t know,” Paul says. “I don’t want to change the course of history because we didn’t put Hard D- I mean, certain songs on the album.”

“Right,” John says. “So we keep the big songs, but we write new ones. Replace the ones that didn’t make it big with _new _songs. How much of a difference can they make, anyway, if they weren’t big hits the first time around?”

“I don’t know, what if someone really liked one of our lesser known songs and…was playing the record in the car when, y’know, someone came past and complimented them on their music taste and they fell in love, and now they won’t ever meet?”

John blinks at him.

“That’s insane,” he says. “Hang on, are you telling me you can play records in the _car_ in the future?”

“CD players and Bluetooth,” Paul says, knowing full well those words won’t mean anything to John.

“Blue-what now? Blue _teeth_?”

“Look,” Paul says, electing to ignore John’s curiosity. “I don’t think we should mess with the track listings.” John sits back on the sofa.

“Alright,” he says evenly. “Can you name every song on our next album?”

“What? No, I-”

“Right,” John says. “There we have it, then. Any songs you remember, we keep. Any you don’t, we replace. How much of a difference can it make if you don’t remember them? We won’t be able to reproduce them anyway.” Paul throws his hands up in frustration.

“Fine,” he says. “And if the world goes to shit because of it, I’ll make sure to let everyone know who’s to blame.”

“Oh aye?” John asks, grinning. “How’re you planning on doing that without getting sectioned for claiming to be from the future?” Paul scowls, and aims a kick at John’s shin – difficult, because he’s sat on the floor – which John dodges expertly.

“Thought Brian had figured it out,” Paul says, suddenly remembering.

“Eh?”

“Came up to me a few days ago, asking why I didn’t tell him,” Paul says. “Thought he was talking about…y’know. The whole time travel thing.” It still feels surreal to say it aloud.

“What _was_ he talking about?”

“Jane.”

“What about her?”

“She’s seeing someone else,” Paul says.

“Shit,” John says.

“Honestly, I’m relieved,” Paul says. “We broke up, anyway, y’know. Back in the past.” John shrugs.

“You can go and find your wife, then,” he says. A bitter taste rises in the back of Paul’s throat.

“I don’t know,” he says.

“Eh?” John says. Paul bites his lip. 

“What if this a second chance?” he blurts. John gives him a funny look.

“At what?” he asks. Paul shrugs.

“Life,” he says.

“Did you fuck it up last time?” John asks. Paul opens his mouth, response immediately on the tip of his tongue – _no, of course not_ – but then stops himself.

He’d managed to lose John, hadn’t he? He can’t think of a worse way to fuck up a life than that.

“Dunno,” he says eventually, hearing the evasive tone in his own voice.

“You fucked it up?” John asks, cocking his head. “How, did you not get married? Not have kids?”

“John,” Paul says warningly. How often does he have to reiterate that his personal life is off-limits? 

“Come ‘ead, I can’t think of any other way you’d consider your life fucked up than not seeing those sappy and paternal instincts through,” John says.

“Stop it,” Paul says lowly. 

“No, I’m not having it,” John says, and he’s pushing now, knows he’s pissing Paul off and is still going, trying to get a rise out of him. “You, not having kids? You infertile?”

“What the fuck, John?” Paul says angrily, only half in disbelief. John Lennon’s not exactly known for caring about being insensitive.

“Well, are you?”

“That’s none of your business,” Paul says sharply.

“So you are,” John says. “_That’s_ why you fucked it up. Couldn’t have kids, eh? No little Pauls running around, telling everyone they know better than them. No one to miss, though, s’pose, so there’s that.”

“You fucking git,” Paul snaps, furious. “I have five.” John blinks, an unreadable expression settling on his face.

“Five kids?” he says.

“Five kids,” Paul confirms.

“Wow,” John says. “Your poor wife.” It sounds like it’s supposed to be a joke, but it comes out biting and cruel. 

“Fuck off,” Paul says harshly. “Now you know. Don’t _ever _fucking talk about my kids again.”

He turns on his heel and stalks off, irate, throwing open the back door and leaning against the side of the house, tipping his head back with more force than necessary and banging it hard against the cold brick wall. His fists are clenched at his side, and he can feel his heartbeat pounding in his ears. He takes deep breaths, drinking in the cold December air, letting it burn his lungs from the inside out, needing to feel _something_ besides the pure hot anger raging in his veins.

He doesn’t even know how long he’s been out there before a light from the door behind him falls on him, brightening the dark behind his eyelids.

“Come back in,” John says quietly.

“Piss off,” Paul says flatly. “Go home.”

“No,” John says. “Come back inside.”

“Not while you’re in there,” Paul says, spiteful and childish. He hears the door click shut behind him, feels the darkness steal back over his eyes, and chances opening his eyes.

John’s standing in front of him.

“Come back inside,” John says again.

“Would it kill you to apologise for once?” Paul grits out.

“Maybe,” John says. “Never tried it, just in case.” Paul decides not to grace that with an answer.

“What did you fuck up?” John asks, after a moment.

“What?” Paul asks.

“If you think this is a second chance,” John says. “What did you fuck up?” Paul laughs, hysterical and humourless.

“On second thoughts, I don’t think I did,” he says. “Think this might be a punishment, not a second chance.”

“What do you want a do-over on?” John presses.

“I’m not telling you,” Paul says.

“Because you can’t, or won’t?”

“Both,” Paul snaps. “Stop asking.”

They stand in silence for a long moment.

“Cyn asked if I stepped out on her on tour,” John says, after a while.

“Christ, spare me your relationship drama,” Paul says. “I’m not in the mood.”

“Said I did,” John says, as if Paul hadn’t even spoken.

“Great,” Paul says. “Really happy for you, John.”

“Told her it was with a bloke.” Paul inhales sharply.

“What?” he says. John’s not looking at him.

“Don’t know why I said it,” he says. “Probably just to get a rise out of her.”

“Yeah,” Paul says. “Sounds like you.”

“But I-“ John cuts himself off.

“But?” There’s a moment of tense silence.

“Dunno,” John says, scuffing the toes of his shoes against the wall. “Forget it.”

“John-”

“Please.” John’s looking at him now, pleading, and he looks…_vulnerable_.

“Alright,” Paul relents. They stand in silence for another moment, until-

“Will you come back inside now?” John asks.

“Will you stop being a git?”

“Don’t know if I can,” John says. “Think it’s genetic.”

“My kids are off-limits, John,” Paul says.

“I know,” John says. The unreadable expression is on his face again, and it takes Paul a minute to put two and two together.

“Why does it bother you?” Paul asks.

“What?”

“My kids.” John shrugs.

“Doesn’t,” he says. 

“Come off it,” Paul says. “Why does it bother you?”

“You don’t have kids,” John says. “You’re twenty-one. You’re not- not tied down, don’t have a life outside of the bloody music. You don’t have _kids_.”

“How many fucking times are we going to do this song and dance?” Paul says, exasperated.

“No, not that, I just-” John cuts himself off.

“Just what?” Paul asks. John says nothing, just keeps kicking the wall and steadfastly not looking at Paul.

And then it hits him.

“Christ,” Paul says, somewhere between soft and incredulous.

“Aye,” John says, fiercely, defensively, “and don’t you go getting the wrong idea about it.”

“John,” Paul begins, and then stops, head spinning. He doesn’t know how to finish that sentence.

“Right,” John says, as though he’s braced himself. “Will you _please_ come back inside? For the sake of my bloody balls, if nowt else.”

“Alright,” Paul says dazedly. “Yeah, alright.” He follows John back inside on autopilot, blinking as he adjusts to the bright light of the kitchen.

Jealous. John’s _jealous_. John’s jealous, and he’s jealous of the fact that Paul’s had a life without him.

\---------------

Ringo turns up on Paul’s doorstep an hour before they’re scheduled to leave for London.

“Cuppa? Don’t mind if I do,” is how he announces himself.  
  
“Well, make yourself at home, why don’t you?” Paul says sarcastically, stepping aside to let Ringo in. Ringo throws him a grin on his way to the kitchen.

“You heard from the others?” he calls over his shoulder.

“Yeah, phoned George the other day and John came ‘round yesterday,” Paul says, following in his wake, although something in him tells him Ringo knows that already. “That’s what you’re here about, in’t it?”

“You’re good, you are,” Ringo says, pointing at Paul. Paul rolls his eyes and goes to grab the teapot.

“What about it, then?” Paul asks.

“Maureen’s been on the phone to Cyn,” Ringo says. “Something about John shagging someone else.” Paul stills, hand hovering over the tap.

“Did she say who?”

“No,” Ringo says, and Paul relaxes. “But it sounded worse than usual.” Paul winces at the _than usual_. John had been an absolute git to poor Cynthia.

“Well,” Paul says delicately, putting a teabag in the cup.

“I’m not asking you to tell me,” Ringo says. “But just…talk to John about it.”

“You should talk to John,” Paul says. “What am I going to say, eh? Cyn told Maureen who told Ringo who told me?”

“He listens to you,” Ringo says.

“Like fuck he does,” Paul says. “John Lennon listens to nobody.”

“He listens to you,” Ringo says again, pointedly.

“He might listen, but he disregards it anyway,” Paul says, handing Ringo his tea.

“Just talk to him,” Ringo says. Paul sighs.

“Alright,” he says. “But don’t get your hopes up.”

“Don’t worry,” Ringo says, taking a sip. “I know John’s the personification of obstinance.”

“God, look who swallowed a dictionary,” Paul mutters, dodging the swat Ringo aims in his direction.

“I should’ve been the one given a book deal,” Ringo declares.

“What would you write about, eh?” Paul asks. “300 pages reviewing different snares?”

“‘Course not,” Ringo says. “Toms, maybe, though. I’m a man of culture.”

“Right, that’s why you didn’t know what the Eiffel Tower was,” Paul says.

“Never said what culture,” Ringo says, tapping his nose.

“You’re daft,” Paul says, shaking his head, but he’s grinning.

“Aye,” Ringo agrees, and takes another sip of his tea.


End file.
